is eyes. When
he saw one he knelt down noiselessly, and supported his arms on two
sticks, so as to keep perfectly still. When the bird was not looking
towards him he cautiously approached it on his knees, holding in his hands
two little dry sticks covered with red cloth, which he gently waved so as
to divert the bird's attention from himself. In this way he gradually got
near enough to pass a noose, which he kept ready at the end of a stick,
round the bird's neck (Fig. 164).

However ingenious these tricks may appear, they are eclipsed by one we
find recorded in the "Ixeuticon," a very elegant Latin poem, by Angelis de
Barga, written two centuries later. In order to catch a large number of
starlings, this author assures us, it is only necessary to have two or
three in a cage, and, when a flight of these birds is seen passing, to
liberate them with a very long twine attached to their claws. The twine
must be covered with bird-lime, and, as the released birds instantly join
their friends, all those they come near get glued to the twine and fall
together to the ground.

[Illustration: Fig. 162.--Bird-catching with a Machine like a Long
Arm.--Fac-simile of Miniature in the Manuscript of the "Livre du Roy
Modus" (Fourteenth Century).]

As at the present time, the object of bird-fowling was twofold, namely, to
procure game for food and to capture birds to be kept either for their
voice or for fancy as pets. The trade in the latter was so important, at
least in Paris, that the bird-catchers formed a numerous corporation
having its statutes and privileges.

The Pont au Change (then covered on each side with houses and shops
occupied by goldsmiths and money-changers) was the place where these
people carried on their trade; and they had the privilege of hanging
their cages against the houses, even without the sanction of the
proprietors. This curious right was granted to them by Charles VI. in
1402, in return for which they were bound to "provide four hundred birds"
whenever a king was crowned, "and an equal number when the queen made her
first entry into her good town of Paris." The goldsmiths and
money-changers, however, finding that this became a nuisance, and that it
injured their trade, tried to get it abolished. They applied to the
authorities to protect their rights, urging that the approaches to their
shops, the rents of which they paid regularly, were continually obstructed
by a crowd of purchasers and dealers in bir