THE MALLARD. 
143 
only practicable in water of a certain depth. The sportsman, 
covering his head with a hollow wooden vessel or calabash, 
pierced with holes to see through, wades into the water, keep- 
ing his head only above, and, thus disguised, moves in among 
the flock, which take the appearance to be a mere floating 
calabash, while, suddenly pulling them under by the legs, he 
fastens them to his girdle, and thus takes as many as he can 
conveniently stow away, without in the least alarming the rest. 
They are also taken with snares made of horse hair, or with 
hooks baited with small pieces of sheep’s lights, which, float- 
ing on the surface, are swallowed by the ducks, and with them 
the hooks. They are also approached under cover of a stalk- 
ing horse, or a figure formed of thin boards, or other proper 
materials, and painted so as to represent a horse or ox. But 
all these methods require much watching, toil, and fatigue, and 
their success is but trifling when compared with that of the 
decoy now used both in France and England,* which, from 
its superiority over every other mode, is well deserving the 
attention of persons of this country residing in the neighbour- 
hood of extensive marshes frequented by wild-ducks, as, by this 
method, mallard and other kinds may be taken by thousands 
at a time. The following circumstantial account of these 
decoys, and the manner of taking wild-ducks in them in Eng- 
land, is extracted from Bewick’s History of British Birds^ vol. 
ii. p. 294 : 
In the lakes where they resort,” says the correspondent of 
that ingenious author, the most favourite haunts of the fowl 
are observed : then, in the most sequestered part of this haunt, 
they cut a ditch about four yards across at the entrance, and 
about fifty or sixty yards in length, decreasing gradually in 
width from the entrance to the farther end, which is not more 
than two feet wide. It is of a circular form, but not bending 
* Particularly in Picardy, in the former country, and Lincolnshire in the 
latter. 
