DECOYS FOR WILD FOWL. 205 



useful lands above was needed? All superfluous 

 water from tlie higher level went to the bog, and 

 ran off in a little stream to the sea by natural 

 position. The moment I set my eyes on this 

 bled-to-death useless waste, — several little natural 

 springs asserting their impossible-to-be-exhausted 

 presence by trickling into the main deep drain, 

 — I imagined my present shooting decoy. The 

 place was let to me for its shooting, with the 

 house in a very bad state of repair, and im- 

 furnished, save one old carpet, no bells in the 

 house, and a roof letting in any amount of wet 

 in rainy and windy weather. 



The ' shooting consisted of two pheasants ; I 

 bestowed on each a Christian name, for I soon 

 got to know them by sight, the one from the 

 other; and, finding themselves no longer shot at, 

 they very soon became tame to me, and took up 

 their residence in tlie laurels round the house. 



I do not think that on the land let to me for 

 shooting purposes there was more than a brace 

 of hares ; but there was a fair show of partridges 

 on the distant farms, and in the Pinaster Woods, 

 close home, any amount of rabbits, as you in- 

 variably find, if tliey are tacitly or otherwise let 



