I03 



HISTORY OF DECOYS— ic-o/^///nn^cy). 



CHAPTER VIII. 



LINCOLNSHIRE. 



Truly this county was the home of Decoys, for I am able to give a list of 

 no less than 38 of these contrivances as formerly existing in Lincoln, only 

 one of which is now worked — that at Ashby. The Decoys of Lincoln 

 chiefly flourished in its eastern and southern portions, notably between 

 Sleaford and Crowland, and from Wainfleet to Boston. A line drawn from 

 Sutton St. Mary's, near Crosskeys Wash, via Crowland, Market Deeping, 

 Bourne, Falkingham, Sleaford, Tattershall, Spilsby, and Wainfleet, to the 

 sea at the latter place, would enclose the large majority of the Lincolnshire 

 Decoys, as well as many of the great fens in which they existed. The 

 principal of these fens, and beginning north near Wainfleet, were the East 

 and West Fens, on the eastern side of which the Friskney, Wainfleet, and 

 Wrangle Decoys were situated — Wildmore Fen, Holland Fen (22,000 

 acres), the Kyme Fens, Sempringham Fen, Pinchbeck Fens, Bourne Fen, 

 Deeping Fen (15,000 acres), Cowbit and Whaplode Fens; besides these 

 there were the great marshes of Gedney, Holbeach, and Moulton, east of 

 Spalding and between that town and the sea. 



North-west of the district just described the Fens reached from 

 Tattershall to Lincoln ; these latter were drained at the close of the last 

 century, and 20 to 30 square miles of country was enclosed in con- 

 sequence. 



In 1808 (about the year most of the Lincolnshire Decoys were dis- 

 continued) it was calculated that near 200,000 acres of fen had by drainage 

 come under cultivation in Lincoln. In the time of Elizabeth the reports 

 of the day state that the East Fen was usually under water throughout the 

 winter ; nevertheless, no attempt to properly drain it or the other low lands 

 of Lincolnshire was made until the close of the last century ; and though 



