WILD-FOWL SHOOTING IN THE FENS. 293 



moors where, in former days, a glance sufficed to satisfy them of 

 food and rest serenely safe from interruption ; and when decoys were 

 strictly kept up about the fens, the quiet and repose offered to wild- 

 fowl by those means, made the country for miles around, a complete 

 preserve. 



Those days can only be looked back upon with regret : never, now, 

 can such extensive spaces of morass and moorland intersected as 

 some were by lakes, islands, swamps, and bogs be restored to what 

 they were. In many places, and more particularly the extensive 

 broads of Norfolk, there were innumerable and extensive shallow 

 pools, at the bottoms of which weeds and grasses flourished luxu- 

 riantly ; and, from the fleetness of the water, were more immediately 

 within reach of the fowl, for which they would seem by Providence 

 to have been specially intended. 



But, although there is at the present day a great falling off in 

 numbers, to what there was in former times, there are yet many 

 places about the English coast where very excellent sport may be 

 had, though regulated in a measure by the mildness or severity of 

 the season. 



A sportsman living in the country of moors and fens, near the sea- 

 coast, may even at the present day have sport without end, and wild- 

 fowl shooting, in severe winters, to his heart's content ; provided he 

 takes that delight in the sport which will incur the necessity of early 

 rising, with energy and indefatigable exertion : 



" Ye fowlers ! manly strength, your toils require ; 

 Defiance of the summer's burning sun 

 And winter's keenest blast, of hail or storm, 

 Of ice or driving snow ; nor must the marsh 

 That quivers to your step deter you." * 



One of the most useful accomplishments of a fen-shooter is, to be 

 able to mimic the notes of such birds as the curlew and plover, and 

 by such means entice them within gun-shot ;f and to acquire this, 

 is by no means an easy task. Much practice, and a good ear, may 

 assist the sportsman to become skilled in the peculiar art ; and no in- 

 structors are so good as experience and familiarity with the notes of 

 the birds. 



* Fowling, a Poem, Book i., p. 7. 



t Chaucer says, " Lo the birde is begyled with the merry voice of the fowler's 

 whislel, when it is closed in your nette." 



