METHOD OF CAPTURING WILD-FOWL IN RUSSIA. 387 



attained, they might often spare their nets from being* broken away : 

 and by providing 1 pen-falls or pits, they would be enabled to take 

 some of the species of wild-fowl in those parts by thousands. 



Wild-fowl are also taken in the lesser rivers of Siberia, by means of 

 small nets stretched across the streams; when, during* night, the 

 birds are disturbed, and in swooping over the waters, fall into the nets 

 and are captured. 



The Kamtschadales are awake to many devices for taking- water- 

 fowl. Necessity and deprivation having 1 forced the spirit of invention 

 among; that people, and taught them that Providence has ordained 

 such birds for man's subsistence in a season when food is extremely 

 scarce ; 



" In those cold regions where no summers cheer, 

 Where brooding darkness covers half the year ;"* 



so he has gifted man with the power to devise means for capturing 

 them ; though he has wisely ordered that they are not to be taken 

 without industry and ingenuity. 



During the moulting season, when there are thousands of wild-fowl 

 of every variety in those parts, they are sometimes pursued in boats, 

 or hunted with dogs, in the same manner as swans are hunted and 

 killed in Iceland. f 



The Kamtschadales also catch numbers of wild-geese during the 

 moulting season. These they take in pits dug near the brink of such 

 lakes and rivers as the birds are in the habit of resorting to. The 

 pits resemble those employed in some countries for taking wild-beasts, 

 and are lightly covered with grass in the same manner ; when the 

 geese, on stepping ashore, and walking about the land in search of 

 food, fall into them and become easy prey to the fowler. It would 

 seem that a similar method of taking wild-ducks was known to 

 the ancients. Pliny says, " Itaque in foveas quibus fera.s venamur 

 delapsce solce evadunt." 



They also take large numbers of wild-fowl in the moulting season, 

 by surrounding them with a fleet of small boats, and driving them 

 into a shallow river or bay with the flood tide ; then by watching 

 them and waiting many hours in their boats at the mouth of the 

 river, the birds are prevented from returning ; and so are compelled to 



* Diyden. t Vide a.nte, page 206. 



J Pliny, lib. x., cap. xxxviii. sec. 112. 



