ON BIRD-NETS. 



By Mr. G. D. ROWLEY. 



^^ He would so^ and then go a bat-fowling/^ 



The Tempest, Act ii. sc. 1. 



Next to ' Waverley ' (the incomparable) many persons think that ' Anne of 

 Geierstein ' takes rank, among the works of Scott. At all events, the 

 Partridge scene (when Arthur de Vere meets Annette Veilchen and the boy 

 with the trained spaniel, driving the birds into the net, in the valley of the 

 Rhine) comes with refreshing beauty on the mind of the reader, saturated as 

 it is with the gloomy horrors of the Holy Vehme. This change is the touch 

 of a master in fiction. 



Netting Partridges* was an ordinary matter in former days. In 

 Willughby's ' Ornithology ' we have a representation of " catching birds with 

 a setting-dog and nett," done with great spirit ; also of a tunnelling net for 

 Partridges, where a man disguised as an ox does the part of the dog. The 

 other illustrations of these modes of capture are very quaint and interesting, 

 such as tunnelling for Quails &c. 



The lithograph of the setting-dog and net is copied from Ray's 



^ I have seen a silk net, in Skye, for taking Grouse, which had been used, and by means of 

 which several islets belonging to the shooting had been well stocked by the keeper, as we soon 

 found to be the case. 



3b 2 



