40 WILD LIFE ON A NORFOLK ESTUARY 



shoot in that particular neighbourhood, unusually good sport. 

 On one occasion he secured a mallard in a most unexpected 

 manner. Hearing an unusual clamour among some tame 

 ducks kept hard by, he went out to see the reason of it. To 

 his astonishment he at length discovered a mallard sitting on 

 the ridge-tiles of an adjoining house. It was but the matter 

 of a few moments to slip back for his gun ; and on his 

 prompt return he shot at and killed that venturesome fowl. 



When skinning a couple of coots, after they had been 

 feeding for about a fortnight on the Zostera^ I found them 

 exceedingly plump and fat ; their stomachs and intestines 

 were packed with " grass blades " in various stages of diges- 

 tion : the fresher " grass " still depended from their mandibles. 

 I found a couple of small periwinkles in one of them. 



"Jan. $th, 1907. Yesterday a fine female goosander was 

 brought me for identification ; it was shot at Buckenham, up 

 the Norwich river, where during the past two or three days 

 fowl had been abundant. The few goosanders and smews 

 'sawbills' that visit us in any numbers only in severe 

 weather appear to have kept off Breydon, although some 

 smews visited the upper parts of it, and frequented the rivers. 

 As usual, most, if not all, of these 'sawbills' were female 

 birds." 



I went this afternoon to Belton and St. Olaves, and had a 

 chat with one or two of my friends who like to watch birds 

 preferably down a gun-barrel. In the washhouse of one 

 hung some coots and ducks, and a bunch of snipe four 

 common and two jacks. His lad, a young urchin who had 

 just left school to work in a cowshed, passed his noon hours, 

 during the bad weather, near a ditch frequented by snipe. 

 He obtained three or four small spring traps, and placed 

 them in the water where he saw footprints ; these snipe were 

 the proceeds of a few hours' "work." The boy's father, a 

 Mr. Brookes, assured me that thousands of snipe came to the 

 marshes just before the snowstorm; and they had also 

 haunted the ronds and saltings. They were so put out by 

 its continuance that seven were seen with dunlins on the 

 mudflats. 



Brookes assured me he might have shot a pair of smews 

 on the river at Burgh, but being eager to secure a mallard 

 swimming close by, in the end he missed them all. Several 



