When I say that I never indulged in egg poaching I do not set up for being any better than my neighbours. I had been forbidden to do it as a lad because my father give it the ugly name of thieving, and it had never tempted me aside. It was tame work at best, and there was none of the exhilarating fascination about it that I found in going after the game birds themselves.
Chapter III
Graduating in Woodcraft
We hear the cry
Of their voices high,
Falling dreamily through the sky;
But their forms we cannot see.
Just as the sportsman loves "rough shooting," so the poacher invariably chooses wild ground for his depredations. There is hardly a sea-parish in the country which has not its shore shooter, its poacher, and its fowler. Fortunately for my graduation in woodcraft I fell in with one of the latter at the very time I most needed his instructions. As the "Snig," as I was generally called, was so passionately fond of "live" things, old "Kittiwake" was quite prepared to be companionable. Although nearly three score years and ten divided our lives, there was something in common between us. Love of being abroad beneath the moon and stars; of wild wintry skies; of the weird cries that came from out the darkness—love of everything indeed that pertained to the night side of nature. What terrible tales of the sands and marshes the old man would tell as we sat in his turf-covered cottage, listening to the lashing storm and driving water without. Occasionally we heard sounds of the Demon Huntsman and his Wish-hounds as they crossed the wintry skies. If Kittiwake knew, he would never admit that these were the wild swans coming from the north, which chose the darkest nights for their migration. When my old tutor saw that I was already skilled in the use of "gins" and "springes," and sometimes brought in a snipe or woodcock, his old eyes glistened as he looked upon the marsh-birds. It was on one such occasion, pleased at my success, that he offered what he had never offered to mortal—to teach me the whole art of fowling. I remember the old man as he lay on his heather bench when he made this magnanimous offer. In appearance he was a splendid type of a northern yeoman, his face fringed with silvery hair, and cut in the finest features. One eye was bright and clear even at his great age, though the other was rheumy, and almost blotted out. He rarely undressed at nights, his outward garb seemed more a production of nature than of art, and was changed, when, like the outer cuticle of the marsh vipers, it sloughed off. It was only in winter that the old man lived his lonely life on the mosses and marshes, for during the summer he turned from fowler to fisher, or assisted in the game preserves. The haunts and habits of the marsh and shore birds he knew by heart, and his great success in taking them lay in the fact that he was a close and accurate observer. He would watch the fowl, then set his nets and noozes by the light of his acquired knowledge. These things he had always known, but it was in summer, when he was assisting at pheasant rearing, that he got to know all about game in fur and feather. He noted that the handsome cock pheasants always crowed before they flew up to roost; that in the evening the partridges called as they came together in the grass lands; and he watched the ways of the hares as they skipped in the moonlight. These things we were wont to discuss when wild weather prevented our leaving the hut; and all our plans were tested by experiment before they were put into practice. It was upon these occasions, too, that the garrulous old man would tell of his early life. That was the time for fowl; but now the plough had invaded the sea-birds' haunt. He would tell of immense flocks of widgeon, of banks of brent geese, and clouds of dunlin. Bitterns used to boom and breed in the bog, and once, though only once, a great bustard was shot. In his young days Kittiwake had worked a decoy, as had his father and grandfather before him; and when any stray fowler or shore-shooter told of the effect of a single shot of their big punt-guns, he would cap their stories by going back to the days of decoying. Although decoying had almost gone out, this was the only subject that the old man was reticent upon, and he surrounded the craft with all the mystery he was able to conjure up. The site of his once famous decoy was now drained, and in summer ruddy corn waved above it. Besides myself, Kittiwake's sole companion on the mosses was an old shaggy galloway, and it was almost as eccentric and knowing as its master. So great was the number of gulls and terns that bred on the mosses, that for two months during the breeding season the old horse was fed upon their eggs. Morning and evening a basketful was collected, and so long as these lasted Dobbin's coat continued sleek and soft.
In August and September we would capture immense numbers of "flappers"—plump wild ducks—but, as yet, unable to fly. These were either caught in the pools, or chased into nets which we set to intercept them. As I now took more than my share of the work, and made all the gins, springes, and noozes which we used, a rough kind of partnership sprung up between us. The young ducks brought us good prices, and there was another source of income which paid well, but was not of long duration. There is a short period in each year when even the matured wild ducks are quite unable to fly. The male of the common wild duck is called the mallard, and soon after his brown duck begins to sit the drake moults the whole of its flight feathers. So sudden and simultaneous is this process that for six weeks in summer the usually handsome drake is quite incapable of flight, and it is probably at this period of its ground existence that the assumption of the duck's plumage is such an aid to protection. Quite the handsomest of the wildfowl on the marsh were a colony of sheldrakes which occupied a number of disused rabbit-burrows on a raised plateau overlooking the bay. The ducks were bright chestnut, white, and purple, and in May laid from nine to a dozen creamy eggs. As these birds brought high prices for stocking ornamental waters, we used to collect the eggs and hatch them out under hens in the turf cottage. This was a quite successful experiment up to a certain point; but the young fowl, immediately they were hatched, seemed to be able to smell the salt water, and would cover miles to gain the creek. With all our combined watchfulness the downy ducklings sometimes succeeded in reaching their loved briny element, and once in the sea were never seen again. The pretty sea swallows used to breed on the marsh, and the curious ruffs and reeves. These indulged in the strangest flights at breeding time, and it was then that we used to capture the greatest numbers. We took them alive in nets, and then fattened them on soaked wheat. The birds were sent all the way to London, and brought good prices. By being kept closely confined and frequently fed, in a fortnight they became so plump as to resemble balls of fat, and then brought as much as a florin a piece. If care were not taken to kill the birds just when they attained to their greatest degree of fatness they fell rapidly in condition, and were nearly worthless. To kill them we were wont to pinch off the head, and when all the blood had exuded the flesh remained white and delicate. Greater delicacies even than ruffs and reeves were godwits, which were fatted in like manner for the table. Experiments in fattening were upon one occasion successfully tried with a brood of greylag geese which we discovered on the marshes. As this is the species from which the domestic stock is descended, we found little difficulty in herding, though we were always careful to house them at night, and pinioned them as the time of the autumnal migration came round. We well knew that the skeins of wild geese which at this time nightly cross the sky, calling as they fly, would soon have robbed us of our little flock.
In winter, snipe were always numerous on the mosses, and were among the first birds to be affected by severe weather. If on elevated ground when the frost set in, they immediately betake themselves to the lowlands, and at these times we used to take them in pantles made of twisted horsehair. In preparing these we trampled a strip of oozy ground until, in the darkness, it had the appearance of a narrow plash of water. The snipe were taken as they came to feed on ground presumably containing food of which they were fond. As well as woodcock and snipe, we took larks by thousands. The pantles for these we set somewhat differently than those intended for the minor game birds. A main line, sometimes as much as a hundred yards in length, was set along the marsh; and to this at short intervals were attached a great number of loops of horsehair in which the birds were strangled.