&00 NATUR A LIST'S CABINET. 



Oilier methods of taking ducks. 



they took wing. Numbers of people assembled, 

 who beat a vast tract, and forced the birds into a 

 net, placed at the spot where the sport was to ter- 

 minate. By this practice (which, however,, ha* 

 been abolished by parliament,) as many as a hun- 

 dred and seventy-four dozen have been known to 

 be taken in one day. 



Prodigious numbers of these birds are taken by 

 decoys in Picardy in France, particularly on the 

 river Somme. It is customary there, to wait for 

 the nock's passing over certain known places ; 

 when the sportsman, having a wicker cage con- 

 taining a quantity of tame birds, lets out one at 

 a time, which enticing the passengers within gun- 

 shot, five or six are often killed at once, by an 

 expert marksman. They are now and then also 

 taken by hooks, baited with raw meat, which the 

 birds swallow while swimming on the water. 



Other methods of catching ducks and geese 

 are peculiar to certain nations: one of these, 

 from its singularity, seems worth mentioning. A 

 person wades into the water up to the chin ; and 

 having his head covered with an empty calabash, 

 approaches the place where the ducks are; 

 which, not regarding an object of this kind, suf- 

 fer the man freely to mix with the flock ; when 

 he has only to pull them by the legs under the 

 water, one after another, and fix them to his belt, 

 till he is satisfied : returning as unsuspected by 

 the remainder as when he first came among 

 them. This curious method is frequently prac- 



