The transit of the aquatic birds to and from Africa often presents remarkable spectacles. During several days at this season (February—March), while cruising in the Straits, the sea has been sprinkled in every direction—both Atlantic and Mediterranean—with bands of duck coming off from the African shore and skimming low on the waves on a northerly or north-westerly course. They do not proceed direct to the Far North, but linger for some days on the Spanish side. Here, early in March, their numbers almost equalled those of November; that is of ducks, for the geese had almost entirely withdrawn. On March 5th clouds of wigeon gyrated at vast altitudes—mere specks in the upper air, while others assembled, massed together in hordes on the water, echando corros para irse—arranging travelling parties, as Vasquez puts it: sure signs both, of the coming change. By March 10th fully four-fifths had disappeared; while on the 15th scarcely a duck of all their thousands remained, except of those species which habitually nest in Spain—e.g., mallards, sheld-ducks, &c., or which come there in spring expressly for that purpose, such as the white-eyed pochards, marbled and white-fronted ducks, and the like.
CHAPTER XXXV.
THE STANCHION-GUN IN SPAIN.
During wet winters in Spain, when marismas and submerged marshes form miniature seas, the customary methods of wildfowling are no longer of any avail. Opportunities of employing the cabresto are few and far between: while flight-shooting on an area indefinitely extended is profitless and uncertain to the last degree. But the marismas, with their myriads of winter wildfowl, appeared to offer, during such seasons, an exceptional—indeed an ideal field for the use of the gunning-punt, and stanchion-gun.
During the wet winter of 1887-8, when we were constrained helplessly to contemplate floating flotillas, all, in effect, inaccessible to our guns—these tantalizing spectacles urged us to seek "some new thing." A gunning-punt with its artillery appeared to be the one thing needed, and with it, we felt confident that from fifty to a hundred duck might often be secured at a shot. Accordingly, in the autumn of that year (1888), we sent out from England boat, gun, and gear—in short, the complete equipment for "the wildfowler afloat."
The little craft duly reached the Guadalquivir in September; but here an unexpected difficulty arose. The Spanish custom-house took alarm. True, the little vessel was an entire novelty and an innovation; even in the Millwall Docks she had created some surprise, and here, she was incomprehensible. No such vessel had ever before floated on Spanish waters, and the official mind took time to consider. That oracle, after several weeks of cogitation, ordered the removal of the tiny craft from the obscure port of Bonanza to the full light of the custom-house at Seville. Here, after many more weeks of delay, it was solemnly declared that that white-painted six-foot barrel was "an arm of war"; that "the combination of boat and gun savoured of the mechanism of war"; and, lastly, that "the boat could not be permitted to pass the Customs until it had been registered at the Admiralty as a ship of war," thus forming an integral part of the Imperial navy of Spain.
We were informed, in reply to a respectful protest, that a high official of the Admiralty at Madrid—the Deputy Chief Constructor, we think, was his title—would "shortly" be visiting the arsenal at San Fernando, where a new war-ship was nearly ready for launching, and that he would then take the opportunity of inspecting our impounded gunboat at Seville.
The measurements of this "British Armada" were: length over all, 22 feet, breadth of beam, 3 feet 6 inches, by 9 inches depth of hold; her armament a gun of eighty pounds weight, throwing sixteen ounces of shot. Not a very formidable vessel, yet a hostile fleet off Malaga would hardly have aroused more official fuss.
Six or seven months elapsed before these difficulties were smoothed away, as difficulties in Spain, or elsewhere, do dissolve when prudently and properly treated; but the wildfowling season was over, the ducks had disappeared, ere the "Boadicea" was released from official durance and allowed to proceed to the scene of action.
The first obstacle was now surmounted, but a second, and more insuperable difficulty arose, one which forms the real "pith" of the present chapter. From the first our local wildfowlers reported badly of the new craft; her trial cruises were not satisfactory, for, while the pateros experienced no difficulty in approaching the less wary birds, such as flamingoes, herons, and the like, yet ducks of no sort could be outmanœuvred; at any rate not on the open waters. On the return of the ducks in autumn following, the fowlers still reported that they found the large packs wholly inaccessible, nor could they secure more than a paltry half-dozen or so at a shot.