MALLARD. 
547 
wild fowl feed during the night. In a still evening 
the noise of their wings, during their flight, may be 
heard at a very great distance, and is a pleasing 
though rather melancholy sound. This rising of 
the decoy in the evening is in Somersetshire called 
rodding. 
The decoy ducks are fed with hempseed, which is 
flung over the screens in small quantities, to bring 
them forwards into the pipes, and to allure the wild 
fowl to follow, as this seed is so light as to float. 
The pipes just mentioned, of which there are seve- 
ral, are narrow ditches, cut on purpose, and covered 
with a continued arch of netting, suspended on 
hoops. These grow narrower from the entrance, and 
are at last closed with a funnel net. It is necessary 
to have a pipe or ditch for almost every wind that 
blows, as upon this circumstance it depends which 
pipe the wild fowl will take to ; and the decoy-man 
always keeps to the leeward side of the ducks, to 
prevent his effluvia reaching their sagacious nostrils. 
All along each pipe, at certain intervals, are placed 
screens made of reeds, which are so situated that it 
is impossible the wild fowl should see the decoy- 
man before they have passed on towards the end 
of the pipe, where the purse-net is placed. The 
mallards are induced to go up one of these pipes by 
the decoy ducks, who lead the way; and when they 
have got them fairly in, they dive under water, and 
leave their wild brethren to be taken in the purse- 
net. 
It often happens, however, that the wild fowl 
2 n 2 
