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inactive reverie, except when they are ex- 
cited by the calls of hunger. In this pond 
the birds sleep all day; as soon as the 
evening sits in, the decoy rises (as it is 
termed,) and the wild fowl feed during the 
night. If the evening is still, the noise of 
their wings, during their flight, is heard 
at a great distance, and is a pleasing, al- 
though rather a melancholy sound. In So- 
mersetshire this rising of the decoy in the 
eve is called rodding. The decoy ducks 
(which are either bred in the pond yard, or 
in the marshes adjacent; and who, although 
they fly abroad, regularly return for food 
to the pond, and are mixed with tame 
ones, which never quit the pond, and are 
taught for this purpose) are fed with hemp 
seed, oats, and buck wheat, of which it 
will take, for the use of a pond for a year, 
about eight quarters of oats, one of hemp 
seed, and one of buck. The other expell- 
ees are : a man to constantly attend the 
decoy ; every four years the poles and nets 
will require to be new, as in the intervening 
years they will be replaced ; some at one 
time, some at another, so as to be all re- 
