If, however, the birds are to be retained, and prevented from gradually withdrawing, year after year, until they shall desert us _in toto_, the use of the battery must be prevented. When that is done, we shall soon again have such days as we once had in and about old Raccoon Beach, when sportsmen innumerable collected to welcome the advent of their prey; when the tale and song filled up the long evenings, and the ducks quacked their hosannas at early dawn; when every point was occupied by a happy sportsman, and every boat came home loaded with game. The use of pivot-guns is another reprehensible practice that has been so earnestly condemned, even among market-gunners, that it has been in a great measure abandoned. Still, however, in some quiet bay of one of the great lakes of the West, where there is no one to observe the iniquity, or of a moonlight night on the Chesapeake, the poaching murderer, sculling his boat down upon an unsuspicious flock crowded together and feeding or asleep, will discharge a pound or two of coarse shot from his diminutive cannon; and wounding hundreds, will kill scores of ducks at the one fatal discharge. The noise, however, reverberating over land and water, scatters the tidings of the guilty act far and wide; and often brings upon the criminal detection and punishment. To avoid this the pivot-shooter will sometimes, as soon as he has fired, throw his gun overboard with a buoy attached to it, and if pursued, pretend he has used nothing but his small fowling-piece. The practice of pivot-shooting, however, has almost ceased, never having been extensively adopted; and has nothing whatever sportsmanlike about it, being a mixture of cruelty and theft. Another mode of pursuing ducks, which is at the same time attractive, exciting, and injurious, is by the use of a sail-boat. Not only is there the excitement of the pursuit, the rushing down wind with bellying sail and hissing water--the crested waves parting at the prow and lengthening out behind in two long lines of foam--but there is the free motion and the pleasant breeze to stimulate the sportsman. This is really a delightful sport, combining the excitement of shooting with the exhilaration of sailing; but as it disturbs the flocks upon their feeding-grounds, as it gives them no rest during the noontide hours, when it appears that ducks--like all other sensible people--love to indulge in a quiet nap, it eventually drives them away; and not only makes them shy of the locality, but injures the sport of the point-shooter, who depends upon their regular flights for his success. It is not often very remunerative, but is uncommonly attractive, and is only condemned with great reluctance on proof of its injurious results.