WILD DUCK. 



267 



I am indebted to the Rev. Richard Lubbock for the 

 following account of the mode of making a decoy, supplied 

 him by a friend in Norfolk. 



In making a decoy it is necessary to have from an acre 

 and a half to three or four acres of water, in a quiet place 

 surrounded by plantation ; the water should be in the form 

 of a star, making six equal divisions of the compass ; in 

 these six recesses must be made six pipes : they are con- 

 structed by digging cuts in the land something in the form 

 of a semi-circle covered over with bows, and a net gradually 

 tapering to the end, at which must be placed a tunnel net, 

 to be taken off when the fowl are driven into it. On 

 each side of the pipe are screens made of reed to shelter 

 the person working the decoy ; the outer side of the circle 

 of the pipe is the one on which the person walks who is 

 decoying the fowl, and in the screens on that side must be 



