253 My Last Day in the Fen, 



punt is drawn up on to a bank, the big gun sponged out and loaded, 

 and, after scanning the horizon with his eagle-eye, he proceeds in 

 search of another trip of fowl. 



Considering the rudeness of the tackle, it is wonderful with what 

 accuracy these fellows shot. The guns were always of the rudest 

 description, and I never saw a swivel of any kind used in tliis fen. 

 The gun just lay flat in the boat, the muzzle protruding a few 

 inches, and tlie line of aim was regulated by the man reclining to the 

 right or left of the boat, according to the distance that the fowl are 

 from him. The end of the butt was padded, and when it went off, 

 the shooter let it fly under his right arm, and woe to his shoulder if 

 by chance it resisted the recoil. The powder in use was the com- 

 mon blasting powder, the shot No. 2, the wadding oaken or coarse 

 fen grass ; charge, about three ounces of powder to one pound of 

 shot. It is best to approach fowl up-wind or sideways -, next to 

 impossible to get them down-wind. When the birds were well in, 

 punt-shooting used not to be such a bad game. Even in this dis- 

 trict, I have known a gunner to shoot 5/. worth of fowl in one trip. 

 The prices here used generally to be 4^. for a pair of whole birds j 

 IS. 6d. for pochards or widgeon. Bat, after all, the life of a w^ild- 

 fowl-shooter, when he has to depend upon it for a subsistence, is 

 hard and precarious — to say nothing of the exposure to weather. 

 The risk of shooting in tliese crank punts, with the tackle these fen- 

 men generally use, is not little. I recollect one poor fellow, who 

 was out flight-shooting in these meadows, breaking his collar-bone 

 with the recoil of the gun, and having to lie all night in the bottom 

 of his boat till daylight (being unable to steer his punt), exposed to 

 the bitter inclemency of a drizzling December night ; and more 

 than once I have known of a gunner being frozen in at night, and 

 having to wade home tlirough a mile of shallow ice. I knew one 

 or two amateurs who sported punt-guns here, but they made sad 

 bungling work of it ; and all that I ever heard of their doing was 

 frightening up the fowl from men who could have killed them. In 

 my day there were several decoys in tliese fens, but I believe Skelton 



