PON TINE MARSHES. 161 



not sorry to find ourselves back at the Ostleria, where 

 my courier, who was a first-rate fellow, had got us 

 a blazing fire and a good dinner. 



There was no end of fowl of all kinds, snipe, ducks, 

 and a good many geese, but the cunning devils knew 

 what they were about, and sat about on every bit 

 of ground that showed itself above the water ; in 

 fact there was plenty of the marshes above water, 

 but they were islands, and not to be got to in 

 anything but a boat. 



Oh ! how I longed for a gunning punt. I saw one 

 or two cacciatori, peasants who were fond of shoot- 

 ing, and who killed ducks, &c., to send to the Roman 

 market, who seemed well up to the kind of thing, 

 and managed to get some shots with a stalking horse, 

 upon which they rode through the water to where the 

 ducks were, and then got off and stalked them by 

 creeping alongside the horse, who seemed well trained 

 for the purpose. They had a largish gun attached 

 to a ring on the front of the saddle, or large pad, from 

 which they fired over the horse's back. The gun was 

 a roughish affair, about a four bore single gun, with a 

 barrel of about six feet long. I own that I should 

 have been afraid to let off such an article, but they 

 never thought of this, and they killed a great many 



M 



