WILD-FOWL SHOOTING. 1 49 



a light boat, and, by means of muffled oars and under 

 cover of the darkness, it is carried into the very midst 

 of the sleeping ducks, and, being fired into their thick 

 columns, great numbers are destroyed as well as crip- 

 pled. This plan of killing wild fowl, however, is very 

 generally reprobated by all respectable parties inter- 

 ested in this sport, and is very properly restricted by 

 legislative enactment. Notwithstanding, however, the 

 general discountenance of the community and the 

 severe penalties threatening the participators in this 

 cruel plan of butchery, many unprincipled poachers, 

 who shoot for the markets, boldly resort to this expe- 

 dient to fill their slender purses, in spite of all law and 

 the universal execrations of those who live in the 

 neighborhood of the bay. These impudent and reck- 

 less fellows know full well the inefficiency of all such 

 laws, owing to the disinclination, or rather want of 

 energy, on the part of the people to enforce them; 

 for, without the assistance of those interested in such 

 matters, all legislative enactments in reference to the 

 preservation of game soon become obsolete, and the 

 laws are no more than a dead letter. 



" Strong efforts, however, were made at the last ses- 

 sion of the Maryland legislature to do something tow- 

 ards the protection of the wild fowl on the Chesa- 

 peake, by the suppression of the surface-boats and the 

 use of large guns ; but the enactment was of little 

 avail as regards the surface-boats, owing to some un- 

 looked-for defect in the framing of the act, and we 

 now learn that there is some probability of its being 

 repealed altogether, which we very much regret : we 



