2l6 GAME BIRDS OF NORTH AMERICA. 



after loading his guns and placing them in the box, with their 

 muzzles resting on the edge, lay down on his back in the bottom 

 of the concern. Numerous decoys were anchored in the water 

 around the battery, and some were even placed on its broad flats. 

 Here, unseen by the ducks, unless they were immediately over 

 him, and patiently gazing into the dim sky, the gunner eagerly lis- 

 tened for the rustUng of wings or the splashes that denoted the 

 settling of the doomed birds. Then, barely elevating his head 

 above his prison-cell, he blazed away. 



The swivel-gun, a huge blunderbuss-looking affair, secured in 

 the bow of a boat, brought down whole flocks at a single discharge, 

 and was another invention of the sportsman's enemy. Be- 

 tween this and the sink-box, ducks in the Chesapeake threatened 

 to become as rare as buffalo will soon be in Kansas ; but the good 

 effects of their partial abohtion are already visible in the increasing 

 numbers of the birds. 



Toling is also practiced here to a considerable extent and with 

 success. A spot is selected where the bottom slopes off some- 

 what abruptly, for the birds will not approach near to the shore 

 except by swimming, and when the water is too shoal to permit 

 them to come within forty or fifty yards, the gunner can get no 

 good chance to shoot at them. 



Those who are not sportsmen are sometimes skeptical in re- 

 gard to toling ducks, and even some duck shooters scarcely put 

 credence in this device. Undoubtedly the plan of " toling ducks " 

 was derived from the Indians, who imitated the fox. " In Norway 

 and Sweden," says Mr. Lloyd, in his exhaustive work on the game 

 birds and wild fowl of these countries, " ducks collect in large 

 flocks in the neighboring lakes and rivers, the strands of which 

 are in general flat. The fowler, on observing the birds, walks as 

 near to them as he can in safety when, falling on his hands and 

 knees, he makes his further approaches slowly and cautiously. In 

 the mean time he causes his well-trained dog, who should be of a 

 reddish color, to gambol before him, which he effects by every now 

 and then throwing the animal a crumb of bread that it catches in 

 its mouth. The ducks, attracted by the antics of the dog, grad- 

 ually approach the strand, and thus the man is often enabled to get 

 sufficiently near them to fire with effect." According to all accounts 



