THE MALLARD. 



119 



It may be proper to observe here, that the ducks feed during \ 

 the night, and that all is ready prepared for this sport in the 

 evening. The better to entice the ducks into the pipe, hemp seed 

 is strewed occasionally on the water. The season allowed by act 

 of parliament for catching these birds in this way, is from the lat- 

 ter end of October till February. 



" Particular spots or decoys, in the fen countries, are let to 

 the fowlers at a rent of from five to thirty pounds per annum ; 

 and Pennant instances a season in which thirty-one thousand two 

 hundred ducks, including Teals and Wigeons, were sold in Lon- 

 don only, from ten of these decoys near Wainfleet, in Lincoln- 

 shire. Formerly, accordingly to Willoughby, the ducks, while in 

 moult and unable to fly, were driven by men in boats, furnished 

 with long poles, with which they splashed the water between long 

 nets, stretched vertically across the pools, in the shape of two 

 sides of a triangle, into lesser nets placed at the point ; and in 

 this way, he says, four thousand were taken at one driving in 

 Deeping-Fen ; and Latham has quoted an instance of two thou- 

 sand six hundred and forty-six being taken in two days, near 

 Spalding in Lincolnshire; but this manner of catching them while 

 in moult is now prohibited.^' 



