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 denizens of the lagoon, and none of them paid more than momentary attention to the floating mass of tousled feathers and shattered flesh and bone which afforded such impressive proof of their enemy's power. Swiftly the population of the pool increased. From the open water where he was feeding, surrounded by squadrons of boisterous, quacking mallards and gentle, soft-voiced teal, the shoveller drake could view a vast expanse of sky. He saw against the bright blue of the heavens, no longer obscured by mist, thousands of ducks of many kinds, not only the more abundant species like those feeding near him, but also widgeon and green-winged teal and even more numerous this morning than the mallards. Buffleheads, too, he saw in small numbers, lovers of the saltwater bays and inlets but questing inland to-day because a winter gale was sweeping the coast.

Flock after flock of all these varied forms shot at express-train speed across the field of his vision, to swerve, wheel, circle and finally settle in some one of the innumerable ponds or lagoons scattered everywhere over the broad river marshes and the watery flats. Yet in all that feathered concourse the shoveller drake saw not one duck of his own kind.

No hunter could tell why in some winters shovellers were common, while in other years scarcely