The gulls scream and the
crows caw all day long, and not a duck takes his head from under his
wing; but the instant either crow or gull utters his danger note every
duck is in the air and headed straight off shore.
The constant watchfulness of black ducks is perhaps the most
remarkable thing about them. When feeding at night in some lonely
marsh, or hidden away by day deep in the heart of the swamps, they
never for a moment seem to lay aside their alertness, nor trust to
their hiding places alone for protection. Even when lying fast asleep
among the grasses with heads tucked under their wings, there is a
nervous vigilance in their very attitudes which suggests a sense of
danger. Generally one has to content himself with studying them
through a glass; but once I had a very good opportunity of watching
them close at hand, of outwitting them, as it were, at their own game
of hide-and-seek. It was in a grassy little pond, shut in by high
hills, on the open moors of Nantucket. The pond was in the middle of a
plain, perhaps a hundred yards from the nearest hill. No tree or rock
or bush offered any concealment to an enemy; the ducks could sleep
there as sure of detecting the approach of danger as if on the open
ocean.
One autumn day I passed the place and, looking cautiously over the top
of a hill, saw a single black duck swim out of the water-grass at the
edge of the pond.
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