164 
METHOD OF CATCHING WOODCOCKS. 
they are as highly esteemed, and therefore as dili- 
gently sought for, as Plovers* eggs with us. Thus, 
not a twentieth part of the former abundant num- 
bers, may now he reared, and, of course, our annual 
winter supply must proportionably decrease. But 
other causes have operated, in this country, still 
further to diminish the number of those which, 
under former circumstances, might be inclined to 
come over,< — namely, the great decrease of our wood- 
lands ; the improvements in agriculture, by which 
their haunts have been drained or broken up ; and, 
lastly, the increase of population, which, more than 
we are aware of, deters shy and solitary birds 
from remaining in neighbourhoods to which they 
formerly resorted. It was a favourite amusement, 
in former days, to catch Woodcocks, by dozens, 
of a night, in places where now not a dozen could 
be taken in a whole season. Large openings were 
left, or rather made, in woods, which, at night, were 
filled up with wide-spreading nets, fastened by 
pullies to tall branches; a man stood concealed, on 
one side, with a rope running through the pullies, 
who, the instant he felt a cock touch the net, let it go, 
and, the net falling over the bird, secured the prize. 
In the fine old beech- wood which we have already 
more than once alluded to, numbers were formerly 
taken, in a wide space, still known by the name of 
the Woodcock-glade, where many a winter’s night 
might now be spent unprofitably, and possibly with- 
out meeting with a single bird. Another mode of 
catching them was by springes, — -a sort of trap, 
formed of an elastic stick, to which was fastened a 
horse-hair noose, put through a hole in a peg, fastened 
