A RIVER YACHTING RESORT 163 



by the decoys. The quacking they gave tongue to when 

 they saw us, which they kept up incessantly all the time we 

 were there, was really worthy of a better cause, so far as the 

 well-being of their wilder congeners was concerned. A few 

 of their number were white, but the majority of them were 

 the small cross-bred wild ducks. Tame ! They were all so 

 tame you could catch them in your hand. They took no 

 notice of our dogs. You had to take care not to tread on 

 them ; but if hustled, they would fly away as strongly appar- 

 ently as wild ones would have done. About a dozen of these 

 the keeper caught without ceremony, putting them into a 

 couple of bags, which he placed in the boat. 



My host was then rowed to an island on the north side of 

 the water, and half-a-dozen of the over-confiding call ducks 

 were anchored down outside the fringe of reeds which sur- 

 rounded his small domain. They were tied to bricks, with 

 about six or ten yards of twine apiece as tether ropes. On 

 the island a shelter or screen had been constructed with reed 

 hurdles, and so skilfully was it arranged that at a distance 

 of a few paces it was well-nigh impossible to distinguish it 

 from its surroundings. 



My agricultural friend and myself were then conducted 

 by a narrow, tortuous path, picked out through the low-lying 

 alder carrs and sedge-covered swamps, to our stands, which 

 were situated at the further end of the broad, and, by the 

 way we traversed, distant perhaps a mile from the boathouse. 



Half-an-hour we were allowed to get to our positions. 

 That short space of time seemed an age to me. 



The path itself was interesting Treacherous bogs were 

 spanned by faggots sunk deep into the slime, and fixed to- 

 gether by wire or willow bands. Rank vegetation, having 

 entwined and twisted its tortuous roots well into these 

 faggots, had caused soil of a kind to be formed, and cut litter 

 having been freely scattered on the path, walking was 

 rendered easy, dry and noiseless. 



About every fifty yards little becks or drains had to be 

 crossed by means of moss-grown bridges, which were merely 



