The spot where they roost is easily found out, because of the peculiar
noise they make upon flying up; and with a little precaution the trees
may be approached without startling them. Years ago the poacher carried
a sulphur match and lit it under the tree, when the fumes, ascending,
stupefied the birds, which fell to the ground. The process strongly
resembled the way in which old-fashioned folk stifled their bees by
placing the hive at night, when the insects were still, over a piece of
brown paper dipped in molten brimstone and ignited. The apparently dead
bees were afterwards shaken out and buried; but upon moving the earth
with a spade some of them would crawl out, even after two or three days.
Sulphur fumes were likewise used for compelling rabbits to bolt from
their buries without a ferret. I tried an experiment in a bury once with
a mixture the chief component of which was gunpowder, so managed as to
burn slowly and give a great smoke. The rabbits did, indeed, just hop
out and hop in again; but it is a most clumsy expedient, because the
fire must be lit on the windward side, and the rabbits will only come
out to leeward. The smoke hangs, and does not penetrate into half the
tunnels; or else it blows through quickly, when you must stop half the
holes with a spade. It is a wretched substitute for a ferret.
When cock-fighting was common the bellicose inclinations of the
cock-pheasants were sometimes excited to their destruction.
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