CHAPTER VIL 



THE DECOY -POND, 



Ergo avidas si forte anates captare libebit, 

 Atque alias liquidis quascunque paludibus iilvse 

 Delectaut molles, captique in gurgits pisces 

 Palmipedum genus alitium : torpentia propter 

 Stagnaque velocesque amnes, deducere fossam 

 Perge celer tenui reliuentem leniter unda." 



Bargjjus de Aucupio. 



A DECOY is a place set apart for tlie enticement, resort, and capture 

 of wild-fowl :* and is simply a pond or small lake, having- one or more 

 semi-circular arms, spanned with nets; the situation of the whole being- 

 in a retired locality, and surrounded with thickly-planted trees and 

 underwood. t It is contrived for the purpose of alluring wild-fowl to 

 resort there, and, by various stratag-ems, to entice them up these narrow 

 arms of water : their retreat is then cut off, by the fowler suddenly 

 making his appearance from behind a place of concealment ; when the 

 birds, in their frig-ht, and endeavour to avoid him, rush forward up the 

 curved arm of water, probably thinking to make their escape at the 

 other end, but ultimately find themselves enclosed in a tunnel-net. 



A decoy is one of the most ornamental acquisitions to a private 

 landed estate that can well be imag-ined, and at all times presents 

 an object of amusement and attraction. When properly manag-ed, 

 and kept strictly quiet, it makes an admirable nursery for wild-fowl, 

 and may also materially assist in the preservation of g-ame. 



It is also a pleasing- and satisfactory resort, in summer, for the 



* In legal language it is termed a " vivarium." Vide 2 Coke's Institutes, p. 100 ; 

 and Holt's Rep., p. 14. 



f Lubbock gives the following definition : " A decoy is a sequestered pool, with 

 curving ditches, and of depth of sixteen or eighteen inches of water, dug from the 

 main water, and covered with a net ; and that the fowl are taken by alluring them 

 from the main water into these fatal retreats." 



