Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1903-12-10
WHAT FOOLS THESE moRrALs
A Mighty Hunter Growing Old and
CYNICAL.


Kimhall Graphic: When puck exclaimed
to the king of the fairies. Lord. what
fools these mortals be- he wasn't refer
ring TO ducks-not the aquatic KIND, any
how. We've been thinking of those fel-
lows down at Lake Andes the past two
wceks-among them our next door nelSh-
bor. Tom Berry, and his brother Lee OF
Chamberlain, and photographer Barton
Of the game city. They have been there
with Il party from Alexandria and a
passel of local hunters all through the
freezing weather of last week and since,
housed in "A shanty by the lake and-en-
joying themselves.
Lord, what fools these mortals be-
If somebody would offer those huners
s. a day and board to camp out in a
shanty on n school section and shoot at
a mark in the grey of the morning they'd
ask him if his grandmother WASN'T a
monkey. But if you're just hunting
ducks, or deer, or anything that will shed
blood If hit in the right spot-well, that's
quite another thing.
Lord, what fools these mortals be-
and there was never a bigger one in the
bunch than the writer of these lines-and
he hasn't fully recovered-not yet.
Many a day in his younger years was
spent on the marshes of the great lakes
In bleak November cutting down the wary
canvasback and his first cousin, the red
head. Out at 4 in the m~orning-two
hours before dayl.ght-with a French
Canadian guide to pilot the way with a
boat full of decoys; punting the boats
through ice formed in the ponds and cut
offs the night before, with the wind COM
ing off the lake cold enough to freeze Yer
giZzard; spray freezing the instant it hit
a boat: drifting ice everywhere-and over
all the swish and whir of wings thai
causes your blood to Jingle like electricity
ard brings n shivering whimper from the
little spaniel curled up in the bow. Over
board go the decoyS-sevently-five or a
hundred of them-and in twenty minutes
from the bill of every one hangs an icycle
two inches long. Splash, down goes a
canvasback-another splash n the little
retriever is pushing his way through
broken ice for the kicking bird on the
edge of the rushes. With every fresh trip
the wash of the sea over his back adds
to the sheet of ice on it until it is half
an inch thick If on shore he'd roll it off;
can't do hat in a boat and sometimes you
have to pull his hair loose where it is
frozen to the boat-but he's as big a fool
as his master-and so the fun 90 goes on
until both MAJ and dog are so cold that
both have to go to the nearest shore and
run around in the reed and grass to keep
from freezing stiff, quite.
Blu oh. the blessed experience of 1.-THE
getting back to red-hot supper of broiled
duck. baked potatoes, j~ohnnycake and cof-
fee-.ong after dark-the fragrant after-
supper cigar or the sweet briar pipe-the
recounting of the days excitements-and
DER all the warmth of the roaring fire
perhaps a big fireplace and blazing back
log. near which sleeps the faithful re-
triever, his slumbers only disturbed by
little whimpering barlks as he lives IN his
dreams the chase of that last winged red
head. a feeling of sweet content and
drowsiness' steals over you; softly tho
arm drops over the side of the big chair,
the briar slips from the nerveless fingers
and over you steals ~sleep-that blessed
sleep which only comes after a day with
the dog and the gun.