moment ,h, h f r ° m . stone - ln a Wltl > BB's, knowing that I did not have 
moment she seemed to take on a some- time to do more than that. The geese 
thing that had never been noticed in would get the 4’s first, with the big 
«! r J ° et , 0re ,l ShG WaS a11 “ wild ” now ‘ ^ad on the second shot. The good old 
Suddenly there came a strong flaw of double gun is the only thing when one 
head’ stret hT ^ WantS t0 change ° neS shelIs 
head stretched to its utmost extent and without noise. A loud “Honk!” 
flew swiftly out and alighted beside the 
drake. They swam about for a while, 
then the drake took wing. The duck 
did not follow, but called him ba»k. 
Finally he tried again, flying for a 
short distance, then returning and 
circling above her until at last she 
arose and followed him far into the 
north. Her owner did not expect to 
see her again, but sure enough at the 
end of a month he found her in the 
pen one morning 
tame and friendly 
as ever. In due 
time when her eggs 
came and were 
hatched the duck¬ 
lings proved to be 
half - strain black; 'A 
thus you have the 
story of “Wild T 
Bill’s” mate, she 
was a result of her 
mother’s northern 
journey. “Wild 
Bill” himself was a 
full - blooded black 
drake, he had been 
caught when young 
in a boy’s musk¬ 
rat trap, so you 
see the two birds 
naturally appealed 
to each other. 
Tom and I 
dropped out of 
sight in our hogs¬ 
heads. Presently 
“Wild Bill” sent 
forth a series of calls that would touch 
the heart of any wild duck; “Mate” 
answered and I heard the winnow of 
wings. I snapped the safety off my 
gun and crouched lower. When I saw 
the first long necks streaking across 
my line of, vision I sprang to my feet 
and let drive. One duck collected on 
his life insurance policy while three 
others put in disability claims. By the 
time I had picked up my dead bird and 
shot over the cripples, Tom was order¬ 
ing me out of sight. I fell rather than 
jumped into my hogshead just in time 
to scare away four big blacks that 
sheared swiftly from Tom’s decoys; 
it’s most always that way when you go 
out to pick up. Faintly came the 
‘Honk-a-Honk!” of geese. I could not 
resist the temptation to raise my head 
just a little, and I saw the big fellows, 
rather high, but heading directly for 
us. I removed one shell from the 
magazine of my automatic, replacing it 
warned me that the birds were over 
head. Tom and I opened up on them 
at the same time. My first shot netted 
no results, but at our second one big 1 
fellow near the end of the line wavered 
and sank lower and lower, hard hit but 
not sufficiently so to do the business, 
and recovering himself trailed along 
after the others—they were too far. 
Our friends on the inner flat ap¬ 
peared to be getting plenty of sport, 
7 < 
1 
r 
/ 
c 
A 
•>;v ' 
l J huto—Herbert K. Job 
A PLIGHT OF PIN TAILS 
the out coming wind brought the 
sounds of their shots quite plainly to 
our ears, yet I doubt if they could hear 
ours at all. It’s interesting sometimes 
to watch a distant gunner bring down 
a duck. You see him put his gun up, 
the bird falls, then when it hits the 
water you catch the report of the gun. 
Tom ripped out three shots, but I had 
been dreaming and I sprang up in time 
to see two sheldrakes from a bunch of 
five come tumbling out of the air. 
“Good boy, Tom!” I called, for I knew 
he wasn’t wholly indifferent to praise. 
Praise a good shot now and then, fel¬ 
lows, it helps a lot. I used to shoot 
clays with a man once on the Portland 
Gun Club. He dropped one now and 
then same as we all do, but if the man 
next to him so much as coughed, it was 
all off for the remainder of the string. 
On the other hand, if we commended 
his good work, he’d turn in scores of 
95 and 97 regularly. 
Page 619 
Did you ever shoot on a' bunch of 
Old Squaws coming down wind? We 
call them Quandies” (or “Quandy”) 
down here in Plymouth. They wield a 
wicked wing, all right, though they are 
not in with the Blue-winged Teal, or 
the Ruddy for speed. A bunch of these 
African dodgers came along and they 
weren’t stopping to pick roses either. 
I swung on them and held, as I sup¬ 
posed, far enough ahead to at least get 
into the front ranks. I connected with 
the very last bird in that outfit and I 
shot him in the tail. A faint ha-ha 
came from Tom’s hogshead so I threw 
an empty shell at his nearest decoy. 
Five black ducks lead by a mallard 
drake swung in with the wind under 
their tails. My! 
how they did sizzle 
along and I desired 
that drake very 
' much. Mallards are 
few and far be¬ 
tween around 
Plymouth, but of 
course Tom had to 
be looking the 
other way and shot 
on a single whis¬ 
tler. “Better see 
Bailey and get 
some glasses when 
we get ashore,” I 
suggested. I had 
been threatening 
for some time to 
examine Tom’s 
eyes. Over in 
range of the Myles 
Standish m o n u- 
- ^ ^ ment on Captain’s 
Hill, Duxbury, I 
noted a raft of 
black ducks, so I 
fell to speculating 
as to just how I would hold on them in 
order to get the most at one shot. 
That reminds me. Did you ever hear 
the story of the man who took the 
ducks out of Duxbury? No? Well, 
here it is. In the old days of spring, 
fall, and night shooting, when the sky 
was the limit and you could use any 
gauge gun from a 20 to a cannon, an 
old “market shooter” used to dig a 
long trench at the end of a pond, al¬ 
lowing the water to flow in to a depth 
of nine or ten inches. Then he 
sprinkled in a bushel or so of corn. 
Next he rigged up a monster-big muz¬ 
zle loader and lashed it to stakes in 
such a position that it would rake the 
length of the trench. He attached a 
line to the trigger and got back out of 
sight. On moon-light nights he would 
let the ducks come in until no water 
showed in the trench, everything was 
black. On dark nights he judged by 
(Continued on page 644) 
