THE TAME DUCK. 463 



old lady has acted on for several years, escaping unscathed by 

 guns and dogs." H. IT, 



There are several varieties of Tame Ducks, but their merits 

 are more diverse in an ornamental than in a profitable point 

 of view, and will be estimated very much according to the 

 taste of individual fanciers. Those who merely want a good 

 supply for the table, cannot do better than just to adopt the 

 sort most common in their own vicinity. No country place 

 should be without some, especially in low situations. A Drake 

 and two or three Ducks will cost little to maintain, and will 

 do incalculable and unknown service by the destruction of 

 slugs, snails, worms, and the larvae of gnats, and other annoy- 

 ing insects. The only trouble they will give, is, that if there 

 be much extent of water or shrubbery about their home, they 

 will lay and sit abroad, unless the poultry-maid or the boy 

 gets them up every night, which should be done. Otherwise, 

 they will drop their Eggs carelessly here and there, or incu- 

 bate in places where their Eggs will be sucked by carrion- 

 crows, and half their progeny destroyed by rats. In the 

 neighbourhood of large pieces of water, or wide-spreading 

 marshes, this will be either impossible, or attended with more 

 waste of time than the Ducks are worth. In which case, and 

 indeed in all cases with Ducks, I believe the slave-owner's 

 maxim to be correct, that it is cheaper to buy than to breed. 

 The smaller they are bought in, the more good service they 

 will perform in ridding a place of minute crawling and creeping 

 nuisances; and the most profitable management of them is to 

 let them gorge all they can swallow, as fast as they can digest 

 it, and to make them fit for table, and for the supply of ma- 

 terials for feather-beds, at the earliest possible moment. The 

 quickest return will be the most remunerative. 



As to cooking them, there is only one traditional old English 

 mode. We would gladly transfer, as an illustration to these 

 pages, Leech's admirable " Romance of Roast Ducks," from 



