to a magnet, they came, and as inevitably; stragglingly, suspiciously by day, in flocks that grew to be a perfect cloud by night.  A tent that had once been white, but that was now weather-stained and darkened by smoke, was pitched near at hand; but they minded it not.  An evil-looking mouse-coloured cayuse grazed likewise, hard by; but for them a broncho had no terror.  A rough blind, ingeniously fashioned from weeds and grasses, stood at the water’s edge; yet again even of this they were unsuspicious.  Now and anon, at long intervals, something happened, something startlingly sudden, bewilderingly loud; and in blind terror they would take wing and vanish temporarily, like smoke.  But this something never pursued them, never repeated itself the same day, and invariably after a time they came back, to take up anew, with the confidence of children, the careless thread of their life where it had been interrupted.

Thus it had been for days past.  Thus it was of a certain morning in late September.  Though it was ten of the clock, they were still there:  sleepy brown mallards, glossy-winged teal, long-necked shovellers, greyish speckled widgeon:  these and others less common, representatives of all the native tribe.  Happy as nature the common mother intended, as irresponsibly idle, they dawdled here and there, back and forth while time drifted swiftly by; and unknown to them, concealed from view within the blind, a dark-skinned man lay watching.

Since before daylight, ere they were yet awake, he had been there.  On soundless moccasined feet he had come.  Motionless as an inanimate thing, he had remained.  Not two rods away the flock were feeding.  More than once the water they carelessly spattered had fallen upon him; but he did not stir.  He had no gun or weapon of any kind.  Though they were within stone’s throw, he had not brought even a rock.  Unbelievable to an Anglo-Saxon sportsman, he merely lay there observing them.  With that object he had come; for this purpose he remained.  A long dark statue, he peered through the woven grasses steadily, admiringly; with an instinctive companionship, a mute forbearance, that was haunting in its revelation.  Lonely as death itself were the surrounding unbroken prairies.  Lonely as a desert of sand, their absolute isolation.  Lonely beyond comparison, beyond the suggestion of language, was that silent human in their midst this autumn day.

How long he would have remained there so, idly watching, no one could have told; the man himself could not have told; for at last, interrupting, awakening, a new actor appeared.  Answering, with a great quacking and beating of webbed feet, the flock sprang a-wing; and almost before the shower of water drops they scattered in their wake had ceased, a road waggon, with a greybearded old man on the seat, drew up beside the tent.

Then, for the first time in hours, the Indian arose and stretched himself.  Still in silence he came back to where the newcomer was waiting.