WITH NETS. 425 



their coming. One then makes use of a gun of large 

 calibre ; and when the flock after the first discharge is scat- 

 tered, dogs are slipped and pursue them. The young then 

 commonly take refuge on the shore, where they can be easily 

 overtaken and captured by the dogs. One can often in the 

 course of the day, if the Jagt be well arranged, bag from 

 thirty to forty geese." 



But a still simpler plan of capturing wild geese in the 

 moulting season is adopted in Pomerania formerly an 

 appendage to the Swedish Crown which, from its ingenuity, 

 is worthy of description. 



" On the isle of Ruden, situated over against Wolgast," so 

 we read in 'Johannis Micrselii Antiquitates Pomeraniae,' 

 1725, "there is excellent Jagt to be had after wild geese. 

 During Whitsuntide, when those birds begin to moult,* and 

 consequently, from their inability to fly, cannot avoid, except 

 by diving, the eagles and hawks, they are constrained to 

 remain the whole day in the water. But in the night time, 

 on the contrary, they must of necessity repair to the land to 

 seek their food. In the evening, therefore, nets are laid flat 

 along the shore, and covered with sand, to conceal them 

 from view ; but after the geese have, in all innocence, passed 

 over the nets, these are placed upright, and the birds driven 

 towards them ; and as they cannot fly over them, they soon 

 become entangled in the meshes, and are quickly knocked on 

 the head with sticks. In this manner forty, fifty, or more, 

 are killed in a single night." 



" In Siberia," we are told by Pallas, " the Cossacks, the 

 Tartars, and other nomade tribes, after the harvest is got 



* The process of moulting is there called Ruden; and it is from this cir- 

 cumstance that the island has derived its name. 



