METHOD OF CATCHING WOODCOCKS. 



they abounded to such a degree, that catching them was 

 a regular trade; and so late as fifty years ago, they were 

 sold at the moderate rate of from six to seven -pence a 

 couple ; but, like Starlings, Wood-Pigeons, and several 

 other birds, they have, of late years, diminished in 

 numbers. 



As far as concerns Woodcocks, this, indeed, may easily 

 be accounted for. In the first place, the demand, not 

 for the full-grown birds merely, but for the eggs, has 

 greatly increased in Sweden, where they are as highly 

 esteemed, and therefore as diligently sought for, as 

 Plovers' eggs with us. Thus, not a twentieth part of 

 the former abundant numbers may now be reared, and 

 of course, our annual Winter supply must proportionably 

 decrease. But other causes have operated, in this 

 country, still further to dimmish the number of those 

 which, under former circumstances, might be inclined to 

 come over, namely, the great decrease of our wood- 

 lands; the improvements in agriculture, by which their 

 haunts have been drained or broken up ; and, lastly, the 

 increase of population, which more than we are aware of, 

 deters shy and solitary birds from remaining in neigh- 

 bourhoods to which they formerly resorted. It was a 

 favourite amusement, in former days, to catch Wood- 

 cocks, by dozens, of a night, in places where now not a 

 dozen could be taken in a whole season. Large openings 

 were left, or rather made, in woods, which, at night, were 

 filled up with wide-spreading nets, fastened by pulleys 

 to tall branches; a man stood concealed, on one side, 

 with a rope running through the pulleys, who, the instant 

 he felt a cock touch the net, let it go, and, the net falling 

 over the bird, secured the prize. In the fine old beech 

 wood, which we have already more than once alluded to, 

 numbers were formerly taken, in a wide space, still 

 known by the name of the Woodcock-glade, where many 

 a Winter's night might now be spent unprofitably and 

 possibly without meeting with a single bird. Another 

 mode of catching them was by springes, a sort of trap, 



