The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1922-02-23
DUCK HUNTING IN MONTANA
A Great Game Country Wasted on a Tenderfoot
By AHRTJ CLARK Butte
BY ALBERT j. CLARK, Butte

a lantern | saw "Swampy" throw a
big chunk of wood in the stove and
help himself to the contents of the
fat bottle. So soon that it seemed
like the same act, I was again awake,
and again the stove was being stocked,
and again the bottle was called on
to do duty, but the fire tender was
new. Although bearing close resem-
blance to "Swampy," he was older
and if anything more rugged. l found
later that this was "Swampy's" ia
Their. Three times more during the
night was the stove stocked and al
ways a thirst was quenched during
the operation. I have often wondered
how the fire would have Jared if we
had had no bottle. The "Swampy"
family was a thirsty outfit.
Quick Work
l can readily understand how a
multitude of things may crowd into
a few moments, as related by people
who have been close to deaths door,
because all of this rafting of stoves
and various draughts out of the bot
tie, the coming and going of the vari-
c~are-takers of the fire, was all
contaminated in the ~twinkling of an
eye. We had hardly gotten to sleep
until it was time to get up, and
"Swampy'' was finishing the last of
the contents of the bottle, while he
admonished us that ducks were be-
ginning to fly" This to me was
another evidence that ducks have
little sense. AS far as l vas con-
cerned they might fly, and fly, and
fly; l would have been glad to let
them fly forever, all I wanted was
sleep. 1t was a cold and frosty morn
ing Cor night, it was not yet light,
but "Swampy" was full of the won-
derful possibilities of the morning.
and other things, and the air was
full of skunk, evidently the skunk
hadn't slept well either, but now to
the hunt.
AS l said before, our cabin was
built on the side of a slough, where
variety of boats were mQored, and
many guns and much ammuni-
ton was placed on board, it became
my duty, as 1 was no hunter, to pro-
pei the boat to the place where the
ducks were flying, which proved to
be about a million miles through the
crookedest slough that ever was. BY
rocking the boat at critical moments,
prevented a large part of the
but to this day | can't
the cruelty of it; how mussed
Ind bloody the ducks were that were
nercifully killed, and how pitiful a
hing it was to see some of them
hat were only wounded, flutter their s
way into the rushes to die
lingering death. Hunting is not I
pretty sport. l
The Blood Lust J
When the blood-lust of my friend !
vas thoroughly satisfied, and the |
,oat was full of ducks that were bet q
er in the air, the journey back '
through the interminable miles of t
rocked slough, to the house of bad ]
doris, will always remain with me .
S a funeral cortege, with me as chief I
lourner. There we found other q
unters taking much pride in prov U
hat they had killed more than l
ly friend, and he bemoaning his hard a
lex in not having a competent boat K
who could keep the boat still n
hen he shot. Then we had sundry q
nd diverse "jiggers" to take the chill
IF, and I began to understand why
Swampy" and the rest were so uni "
dry; I began to have a n
like a hunter. q
We went to dinner at the house of Il
to eat ducks that to me W
ffered no fair return for the agony n
had endured. I still think that lc
lid game is a much over-rated eat a.
ole, and that it would much better A
~ n ~ IL IL q
5wampy" had a Chinese cook who Ct
ad no aesthetic notions about cook IL
lg; he placed the ducks on a block
nd chopped them into convenient D
yes for cooking, with an axe, and h
len fried them until they were as "
ack as a hat and had no shape nor Il