THE WILD DUCK. 85 



tliein so engaged in various places. The Curator of the Royal 

 Botanic Garden, Belfast, informs me that they eat of them so 

 voraciously there as to become surfeited, and to be obliged to sit 

 down and rest, apparently sick from being overgorged. Another 

 observant person has often known ducks to be " all but choked" 

 from the quantity of slugs they had eaten, so that their owners, 

 believing them to be at the point of death, killed them, that the 

 birds might not be lost as food. Lvmax agrestls, the chief 

 destroyer of the vegetation of the garden, &c., is their chief prey. 

 So well is their feeding on slugs established here, that there 

 are some persons who refuse to eat of these birds on account of 

 the foul diet (as they consider) on which they have fattened. 



Wlien proceeding from Utrecht to Gorcum, on the 2nd June, 

 1S26, I was surprised to observe among the reeds, in the wild 

 fens, numerous long narrow hampers, like those used in the north 

 of Ireland to pack potatoes in for exportation, and, on inquiry, 

 learned that they were placed there for wild ducks to breed in, so 

 that the young brood might be secured before they were able 

 to fly. 



This species is fully as plentiful in Ireland as in England. If 

 tlie observations of Sir William Jardine'^ and Mr. Macgillivray, 

 respecting the numbers seen in winter, apply to Scotland, the 

 wild duck is more abundant during that season in Ireland than it 

 is there. One eloquent paragraph from Wilson must be here 

 given. .lie remarks : — "This is the original stock of the common 

 domesticated duck, reclaimed, time immemorial, from a state of 

 nature, and now become so serviceable to man. In many indi- 

 viduals, the general garb of the tame drake seems to have under- 

 gone little or no alteration ; but the stamp of slavery is strongly 

 imprinted in liis dull indifferent eye and grovelhng gait, while the 

 lofty look, long tapering neck, and sprightly action of the former, 

 bespeak his native spirit and independence."t 



* 'British Birds,' vol. iv. p. 10'.). 



t ' Amer. Ornit.,' vol. iii. p. 141. Jardinu's edit. 



