Goose. NATATORES. ANSER. 273 
be heard at a great distance, and has not unaptly been com- 
pared (when so heard) to the cry of a pack of hounds. 
They are at all times extremely watchful, and can only be 
approached within gunshot by the person of the shooter 
being concealed. This is effected in the southern parts of 
the kingdom by means of a flat-bottomed boat, so built as 
to draw very little water, and whose gunwale barely rises 
above the surface, armed with a large fowling-piece, that 
traverses the half-deck upon a swivel. In this boat the 
fowler lies flat, and directs its motion by a paddle or small 
oar, till he comes within range of the flock; when he fires, 
either as they float upon the water, or just as they rise. 
Great havoc is sometimes made in this way, not only amongst 
the Brent Geese, but amongst Widgeon, and other kinds of 
wild fowl, as we learn from Colonel HawkeEr’s amusing 
treatise, to which I refer my readers, and where they will 
find every direction necessary for this particular kind of 
sporting *. Previous to this mode of shooting being adopt- 
ed, all the Brent Geese, and different species of Ducks upon 
our northern coast, were killed by moonlight, by the fowlers 
placing themselves in various parts of the lake, seated on a 
bundle of straw, and patiently waiting for the approach of 
the wild fowl, as they flew about in quest of feeding places. 
The destruction, however, in this way was very limited ; 
the number that fell to the gun of an individual during the 
whole season perhaps did not equal the fruits of a single 
day’s sport with the boat and its swivel gun. Like the rest 
of the genus, the Brent Goose never dives in search of food; 
but that this does not arise from any incapability of submer- 
sion, as has been supposed, is evident from the ease with 
which it plunges, and the great distance it can go under wa- 
“ Upon the Holy Island sandy flats, where the above method was in- 
troduced, about two years ago, by a man from the Norfolk coast, I am 
credibly informed that twenty-two Brent Geese were killed and secured 
at one discharge during this season, 1831. 
VOL. II. Ss 
