DTJCK-SHOOTING. 275 



and the reports of others, such would really seem to 

 be the case. 



" All the lakes and rivers near the Gulf of Bothnia," 

 writes the Honourable Richard Hely-Hutchinson to me, 

 " afford most excellent shooting. There you may see duck 

 and mallard, with teal, in swarms. I have no recollection 

 of my best day's sport, but I certainly shot more water- 

 fowl in one season than I ever killed before, or perhaps 

 ever shall again, at least with the small gun." And 

 Mr. Richard Dann, who spent several summers at Qvick- 

 jock, in Lapland, wrote me to the same effect. 



I, for my own part, never had any very extraordinary 

 Duck-shooting in the Peninsula, though quite sufficiently 

 good to satisfy me. When my tent was first pitched 

 at Ronnum, ducks were tolerably abundant, both in the 

 river Gotha, and in the numerous inlets of the Wenern ; 

 but at an after-period, owing to drainage, and the increase 

 of gunners, their numbers fell off greatly ; and duck- 

 shooting being a rather favourite amusement of mine, I 

 not unfrequently devoted a day to the purpose. It was 

 not, however, until towards the end of July, when the 

 young birds were for the greater part fully fledged, that 

 I was accustomed to take the field. On the whole, my 

 sport was very fair, as in the early part of the autumn I 

 commonly bagged in the day from eight to twelve couple, 

 and sometimes more, of mallard alone ; and even when 

 the season has been far advanced, say the middle of 

 October, I have shot as many as seven and a half couple. 

 On one occasion a friend and myself bagged in a single 

 day twenty and a half couple of mallard; and in the 

 four consecutive days that we were together sixty and odd 

 couple, and all, as a rule, strong on the wing. Though I 

 did not give xip very much time to the sport, yet during 

 my first season, at Ronnum I shot to my own gun upwards 

 of one hundred and fifty couple of wild 'fowl, of which fully 



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