DECOYS roil WILD FOWL. 191 



little mound denoting the spot of the vilhigo 

 cock-pit. 



There are two sorts of decoys; the ancient, 

 and by far the most profitable in a pecuniary 

 point of view, and for which a protective law by 

 tlie l^egislature was j^rovided and is still unrepealed, 

 is that for the ^Haking " of wild fowl; the more 

 modern decoy pool, or, properly speaking, pools, is 

 simply a breadth of water kept quiet and provided 

 with pinioned decoy birds, for the purpose of 

 collecting fowd sufficient for the 1)ag to be made 

 by the gan. 



The decoy for faJcinr/ fowl is the first to which I 

 will invite the reader's attention. 



In the olden time these decoys generall}^ con- 

 sisted of an artifi(3ial piece of water, from one to 

 two acres in extent, square in shape, with four 

 pipes leading from the four corners, to suit, as the 

 old boys used to say, the four different points 

 of the wind, as it Avas a supposed matter of neces- 

 sity for the decoy man to keep down wind of the 

 ducks, lest they should '^ smell him out," and be 

 scared by their noses from the pool ! 



Some of the smaller decoys were made with 

 one, two, or three pij^es, according to the con- 



