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As we shot through the gap into the smooth water beyond, we once more gave way, the boat's head being kept in the direction of lights that we saw twinkling I in the distance, apparently in some village beyond the inner embankment, when all at once we dashed in amongst thousands of wild geese, which rose with a clang, and a concert of quacking, screaming, and hissing, that was startling enough.
Prince Leopold had risen early, like all the hard-working potentates of the continent, and got away to the manoeuvres somewhere at six o'clock; the decorations had been removed, and the court-yard where the hired coach and pair of the prince had rolled in the evening before had only a few majestic ducks waddling about in it and quacking together, indifferent to the presence of a yellow mail-wagon, on which the driver had been apparently dozing till the hour of noon should sound.
"The moon is up, the lake is all white, and the birds are flying all around. Lie still or you'll make yourself worse. Stiller than that! If you don't you can't hear things courting. The ducks are quacking, the bull frogs are croaking, and everything. Lie still, still, I tell you!" "Oh good Lord, Doc!" groaned the Harvester in desperation.
This they did not find out till they had got to a considerable distance. Turning off inland, they, however, quickly found themselves in the midst of hundreds of birds, when they began to lay about them right and left, knocking over vast numbers; those they missed only poking out their long necks, and quacking and screeching at them.
Such clapping of wings, and hurrying to and fro, and quacking, and shrieking, and whirling here and there, was never seen among a feathered community. They must have been very glad when we took our departure.
It was an enjoyable morning, for gunners were passed, secreted behind their "blinds," or pens, of pine brush, which looked like little groves of conifera growing out of the shoal water. Geese were honking and ducks were quacking, while the deep booming of guns was heard every few minutes. Decoy-birds were anchored in many places near the marshes.
The live decoys began quacking nervously. The curé, about to speak, tip-toed over to the firing-slit and let down cautiously one of its compartments. "A flight of plovers passing over us," he remarked. "Yes, there they go. If the wind will only hold you shall see there will be ducks in," his gray eyes beaming at the thought.
Then the pretty feathered things Tuck their heads beneath their wings, Just as if for rest inclined, Quacking: "How well we have dined!" Later on, at evening cool, You will find them in the pool; Yellowbill and Featherbreast, Speckletail, and all the rest!
"That is just as you please, Aunt Patty. We shall be happy to see you whenever you choose to come. Good-by". "Good by", said Mrs. McNab in a quacking, quavering, half resentful tone, as she closed the door behind her. Adèle went immediately to the adjoining pantry, called Bess, a tidy looking mulatto, gave her directions for the morning work and then went up stairs to relieve her mother. Mrs.
As it happened, we arrived in the very nick of time, for we had scarcely taken up a position among the reeds, in a situation that enabled me to command a view of a good wide stretch of water, when I saw a faint smudge against the clear sky southward, which rapidly resolved itself into a big flight of wild duck heading directly for the end of the pond near where I was ambushed; and I had only time to pass my rifle to Piet and receive from him the shot gun in exchange when, with much quacking, the flight wheeled and proceeded to settle down upon the surface of the water.
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