190 ANAS BOSCIIAS. 



sedge. From within this the gunner, unseen and 

 unsuspected, watches his collecting prey, and, when a 

 sufficient number offers, sweeps them down with great 

 effect. The mode of catching wild ducks, as practised 

 in India,* China,f the island of Ceylon, and some parts 

 of South America, J has been often described, and seems, 

 if reliance may be placed on those accounts, only 

 practicable in water of a certain depth. The sportsman, 

 covering his head with a hollow wooden vessel or 

 calabash, pierced with holes to see through, wades into 

 the water, keeping his head only above, and, thus 

 disguised, moves in among the flock, which take the 

 appearance to be a mere floating calabash, while, 

 suddenly pulling them under by the legs, he fastens 

 them to his girdle, and thus takes as many as he can 

 conveniently stow away, without in the least alarming 

 the rest. They are also taken with snares made of horse 

 hair, or with hooks baited with small pieces of sheep's 

 lights, which, floating on the surface, are swallowed by 

 the ducks, and with them the hooks. They are also 

 approached under cover of a stalking horse, or a figure 

 formed of thin boards, or other proper materials, and 

 painted so as to represent a horse or ox. But all these 

 methods require much watching, toil, and fatigue, and 

 their success is but trifling when compared with that 

 of the decoy now used both in France and England, $ 

 which, from its superiority over every other mode, is 

 well deserving the attention of persons of this country 

 residing in the neighbourhood of extensive marshes 

 frequented by wild ducks, as, by this method, mallard 

 and other kinds may be taken by thousands at a time. 

 The following circumstantial account of these decoys, 

 and the manner of taking wild ducks in them in 

 England, is extracted from Bewick's History of British 

 Birds, vol. ii, p. 294 : 



* Naval Chronicle, vol. ii, p. 473. 

 f Du HALDE, History of China, vol. ii, p. 14'J. 

 j ULLOA'S Voyage, i, p. 53. 



Particularly in Picardy, in the former country, aud Lincoln- 

 shire in the latter. 



