Valencia 423 
the ducks either swimming complacently forward or breaking 
back over the encircling flotilla, when, in each case, large numbers 
were killed with crossbows. To celebrate the nuptials of Phillip 
III., no less than 300 boats were thus employed. The second 
plan involved persuading hosts of quietly paddling ducks to swim 
forward into reed-beds through which winding channels had been 
cut, and over which nets were spread. 
Needless to add, neither method would nowadays serve to 
outwit twentieth-century wildfowl. 
By the beginning of last century (about 1830), owing to the 
destruction of forests and reclamation of land for grazing or rice- 
cultivation, the bigger game had already disappeared; but the 
flights of winter wildfowl actually increased in proportion to the 
extended area of rice. 
The Albufera continued to be the property of the Crown of 
Spain from 1250 till May 12, 1865, when the Cortes decreed, 
and Queen Isabella II. confirmed, its transference to the State. 
At the present day the shooting on Albufera is conducted on 
purely commercial and up-to-date principles. The whole area 
is mapped out into sections like a chessboard, and each consider- 
able gun-post (or replaza, as it is called) is sold by auction. 
These specially selected replazas number thirty, and are sold 
for the entire season, the prices varying from £150 for No. 1 
down to about £6 for No. 30. 
These thirty “reserved stalls” having been disposed of in 
public competition, the remaining mid-water positions (for which 
the charge is a dollar or two per day) are then apportioned by 
drawing lots. Finally, licences are issued at a few pesetas to 
shoot from the foreshores or from small launches stationed among 
the reeds at specified spots, but which the licensee must not 
quit during the shooting. 
The sum that finally filtered through to the State during 
forty years varied between 7500 and 23,000 pesetas (say £300 
to £900), a record price being obtained in 1868, namely, 40,000 
pesetas. The municipality of Valencia is seeking to obtain the 
cession of the Albufera from the State. 
The gun-posts used are either flat-bottomed boats which can be 
thrust into a sheltering reed-bed ; or, should no cover be available, 
sunken tubs masked by reeds or rice-stalks. The posts are fixed 
nominally at a rifle-shot (tiro de bala) apart—say 200 yards. 
