208 DUCK-SHOOTING. 



boat, without any keel, about sixteen feet long, and 

 three feet broad, drawing about three and a half 

 inches water. It was managed by a pole, twelve 

 feet long, made about six inches broad at each end, 

 which the man held in the centre, and dipping each 

 end in, propelled his boat along ; and when he got 

 near his prey, used two small paddles, only three 

 feet in length, by which he guided his skiff. His 

 gun, which was fixed on a rest, consisted of two 

 immense barrels, about nine feet long, an inch and 

 a quarter in diameter, requiring three quarters of 

 a pound of powder and two pounds of shot to load 

 both barrels, which were fired together. His suc- 

 cess in one week, was a hundred and three Ducks, 

 and eleven Geese, besides smaller birds. At one 

 shot, he had been known to kill two hundred and 

 one Sea-Purres. He earned about ten pounds per 

 week, and his companion rather more, by a similar 

 plan. 



But the exploits of our British fowlers ae insig- 

 nificant, when compared with the grand scale on 

 which this warfare is carried on in Mexico, where 

 a great Tiro de Patos, or Duck-shooting, is, we are 

 assured*, one of the most curious scenes that it 

 is possible to witness. The Indians, by whom it is 

 principally conducted, prepare a battery, composed 

 of seventy or eighty musket-barrels, arranged in two 

 rows, one of which sweeps the water, while the 

 other is a little elevated, so as to take the Ducks as 

 they rise upon the wing. The barrels are connected 

 with each other, and fired by a train ; but the whole 

 apparatus, as well as the man who has charge of it, 

 * Ward's Mexico. 



