Part 2

Tramping the beach or following up on land requires the smallest outfit of any, all that is necessary being the gun and your equipments. It is best to wear rubber boots, unless you intend to shoot along hard beaches or dry meadows. This tramping of the meadows will afford rather good sport when they are flooded, and although you may not get as many birds as by decoying, the action it necessitates adds much to the pleasure. However, if the birds are plentiful and inclined to move about, I should advise the use of a blind and decoys.

Let us suppose we are going out at low water to look out for the birds on the beaches. You have arrived at the scene of action and loaded your gun. Put it in the hollow of either arm; if there are two shooting, carry the guns in opposite arms. In walking along the water you should not walk on the beach, if there is one, but about fifteen or twenty feet back, going up to the beach at frequent intervals to study it for a distance ahead. By this means the birds behind the sedge-grass will not be able to see you until you are quite near. If when studying the beach ahead you do not see any birds, you should make a careful note of the likely places behind which snipe may be, and use corresponding care when approaching them. The snipe do not take to wing until you get quite near, and there is little danger of frightening your birds by these short examinations. You have been walking along the shore in the described manner for some time, and in one of the above examinations you locate some birds, let us say two hundred feet off. Crouch down in the grass and make a study of the lay of the beach where the snipe are, noting with care the positions of any high tufts of grass, bushes, or anything by which you can locate the place without seeing the beach, and it is best to select two between which the game is. Now strike inland some fifty feet, more if level meadow, and move up parallel to the beach until opposite the marks noticed. When directly in back of where you think the birds ought to be, work up to the beach, cocking your gun, and holding it in a position for instant use. You will probably get within twenty or thirty feet of the edge of the grass, when the shrill whistles of the snipe will let you know the birds are off. It is then only a question of your skill as to whether you bag some. In approaching this way, the birds will usually fly directly off-shore and away from you for a distance, thus affording the best kind of a shot. Taking the birds by surprise, you can afford to let them get steadied in flight before shooting. Do not shoot as the bird first starts off, as his twisting will destroy the aim; but let him get settled, cover him with the muzzle of your gun, following him with it for an instant until your hand is steady, and then pull the trigger.

Perhaps it should be mentioned here that if the wind is at all heavy you will never find the birds on a lee shore; always look for them on the windward. If the snipe is "flushed" on the meadow, or any other place where he has the choice of direction, he will always rise against the wind; so if you approach up wind you will get mostly driving shots, but if down wind good shots will be presented.

Following the birds by boat is sometimes very effective. Perhaps before coming to the shooting proper we should consider the boat. The best kind of boat for this work, where there is a great deal of running up on beaches, is a sneak-box (description of shooting-boat in HARPER'S ROUND TABLE No. 818). The long bow overhang makes it easy to land without running the boat hard aground. We will consider the sailing first. No special equipment is required, but if you are going out alone a yoke-line attachment will be necessary for steering (see sketch). By this device you can steer the boat from any part of the cockpit by simply catching hold of the line at the nearest place, and pulling either way you wish.

If alone, it is best to sit pretty well aft, as you are less liable to be bothered by the sail, but if there are two in the boat, one shooting and the other sailing, the man with the gun should sit as far forward as convenient, and on the side next to the shore. If the sail happens to be on the shore side, if possible sit on the forward deck so as to be able to shoot ahead of the mast; if not, you will have to shoot under the sail or in whatever manner a shot offers.

The pleasure of the expedition may be greatly marred by mismanagement of the boat. There are no particularly new problems in sailing presented, but there are several points that must be borne in mind. Above all, the boat must not race alongshore, but should only drift along about thirty or forty feet off, because, when going at only a fair speed, objects on shore pass so rapidly as to make all accurate shooting impossible; and, also, a boat travelling even slowly in shallow water will kick up such large waves, that these, breaking on the beach, will frighten all the birds within hearing.

There is one peculiarity of snipe that perhaps ought to be mentioned. When the flock is feeding on small beaches broken up by patches of grass extending down to the waters edge, the birds, if approached on the water in a direction parallel to the beach, will run along it until they are all bunched at the grass before taking wing. This affords a good shot, and you can usually bag several. If you prefer to row after the birds, select a two-oared light flat-bottomed boat, and sit in the front row seat, the person pulling occupying the rear. Sometimes the boat is propelled with a pole used over the stern. There is one indispensable article in shooting snipe from a boat--a crab-net. By this, the dead and wounded birds can easily be picked up.

Decoying, though requiring quite an extensive outfit, under proper conditions, will yield fine results. The blind is of first consideration, much depending on its location. Before building it you should try to determine where the birds are flying the day in question, though the following general locations may be of help in the selection: a neck of land separating two streams or arms of a river; a sedge island; or a flooded meadow. In choosing the site try to find a spot where natural conditions give as much cover as possible, as behind weeds or tall grass, and try not to alter the appearance in the construction. If you intend to shoot on a meadow, place the blind at a convenient distance from some spot where you notice the birds feed. If on a beach, try and place it so as to get a raking shot. In the meadow-blind, if you have been able to find a convenient clump of weeds, cut down the extra ones so as you will have a thin circle around you, or as near so as possible, and line the inside with hay or anything procurable, filling up the thin places in the barrier of live weeds with those you cut down. If no clump can be found, look over the meadow until you find some stiff-stemmed weeds, and cut them quite near the roots. Carry these to the selected spot, and construct the blind by sticking the ends in the ground, and finish as before. The beach-blind may be constructed like this, or a hiding-place can be made in the sedge-grass.

The decoys are an essential part of the outfit. They can be made at home, and should be at least twice life size. Their construction may be understood from the sketch. In painting them, try to lay the colors in the same relations as in the live bird.

Suppose we have constructed our blind near a beach, and set our decoys, some twelve or fifteen, fairly bunched. A flock is seen approaching. They see our decoys, and head in, apparently just skimming the water. Let them land, if they will; if not, fire as they wheel off. They will most likely land, and if clear of the decoys use the right barrel, reserving the left (usually choked) for when they fly off. You have most likely bagged some birds, but do not attempt to recover them now, for a flock will often return if any birds are lost. If there are any dead birds on the water, you had better keep an eye on them, as the crabs are fond of dead snipe.

A few words here about the gun. The dangers of mishandling have been gone over so often that it is unnecessary to repeat them. A boy is perfectly safe with a gun if he will bear in mind the old and perhaps rather ambiguous saying, "A gun is always loaded." A gun should not be allowed to stand for anytime with the remains of previous discharges in the barrels, as the acid contained in the powder will pit them. It is best to follow the rule of swabbing it clean after a day's sport; first, perhaps, if very dirty, with the wire burr, and polishing with soft rags. Sometimes the barrels become so much coated that they cannot be cleansed by these means, and it will be necessary to wash them out with water. If this is the case, be sure to remove every trace of moisture afterwards. Always keep every part of the gun well coated with oil, and never forget to oil the barrels after swabbing them clean, bearing in mind also that the heat of the discharge will dry the oil off the outside.

A great deal might be said about shells, but it is not essential here. Machine-loaded shells with suitable charges for snipe can be bought for about $1.40 a hundred, and will answer all purposes very well. There is room for discussion as to the proper charge. I should say 2-3/4 or 3 drams of powder and 1 ounce of either No. 8 or No. 9 shot is a good load for a 12-bore gun. The smaller shot is best for flock shooting. In the sketch is represented a section of a shell showing the position and kind of wads, and there is also shown a light home-loaded shell to kill crippled birds. Many sportsmen load their own shells, but this takes much time and trouble, and the saving is not as great as would be supposed, unless expensive powders are used. The boy learning to shoot should by all means buy his ammunition, at least for such a time, until he will know exactly what he is doing when loading his own shells.

THE VOYAGE OF THE "RATTLETRAP."

BY HAYDEN CARRUTH.

II.

The port of Prairie Flower was in the eastern part of the then Territory of Dakota. It stood out on an open plain a half-dozen miles wide, which seemed to be the prairie itself, though it was really the valley of the Sioux River, that funny stream which could run either way, and usually stood still in the night and rested. To the east and west the edges of this valley were faintly marked by a range of very low bluffs, so low that they were mere wrinkles in the surface of the earth, and made the valley but very little lower than the great plain, which rolled away for miles to the east and for leagues to the west.

It was a beautiful morning a little after the middle of September that the Rattletrap got away and left Prairie Flower behind. The sun had been up only half an hour or so, and the shadow of our craft stretched away across the dry gray plain like a long black streak without end. The air was fresh and dewy. The morning breeze was just beginning to stir, and down by the river the acres of wild sunflowers were nodding the dew off their heads, and beginning to roll in the first long waves which would keep up all day like the rolling of the ocean. We shouted "Good-by" to Grandpa Oldberry and Squire Poinsett, but they only shook their heads very seriously. The cows and horses picketed on the prairie all about the little clump of houses which made up the town looked at us with their eyes open extremely wide, and no doubt said in their own languages, like Grandpa Oldberry, that they had no recollection of seeing any such capers as this for many years.

"See here," I said, suddenly, to Jack, "where's that dog you said was going to follow us?"

"You just hold on," answered Jack.

"Oh, are we going to have a dog too?" asked Ollie.

"You wait a minute," insisted Jack.

Just then we passed the railroad station. Jack craned his head out of the front end of the wagon. Ollie and I did the same. Lying asleep on the corner of the station platform we saw a dog. He was about the size of a rather small collie, or, to put it another way, perhaps he was half as big as the largest-size dog--if dogs were numbered like shoes, from one to thirteen, this would have been about a No. 7 dog. He was yellow, with short hair, except that his tail was very bushy. One ear stood up straight, and the other lopped over, very much wilted. Jack whistled sharply. The dog tossed up his head, straightened up his lopped ear, let fall his other ear, and looked at us. Jack whistled again, and the dog came. He ran around the wagon, barked once or twice, sniffed at the pony's heels and got kicked at for his familiarity, yelped sharply, and came and looked up at us, and wagged his bushy tail with a great flourish.

"He wants to get in. Give him a boost, Ollie," said Jack.

Ollie clambered over the dash-board and jumped to the ground. He pushed the dog forward, and he leaped up and scrambled into the wagon, jumped over on the bed, where he folded his head and tail on his left side, turned around rapidly three times, and lay down and went to sleep, one ear up and one ear down.

"He's just the dog for the Rattletrap," said Jack. "We'll call him Snoozer."

"That looks a good deal like stealing to me, Uncle Jack," said Ollie. "Doesn't he belong to somebody?"

"No," said Jack, "he doesn't belong to anybody but us. He came here a week ago with a tramp. The tramp deserted him, and rode away on the trucks of a freight train, but Snoozer didn't like that way of travelling, because there wasn't any place to sleep, so he staid behind. Since then he has tried to follow every man in town, but none of them would have him. He's a regular tramp dog, not good for anything, and therefore just the dog for us."

Snoozer was the last thing we shipped, and after taking him aboard we were soon out of the harbor of Prairie Flower, and bearing away across the plain to the southwest. In twenty minutes we were among the billowing sunflowers, standing five or six feet high on either side of the road, which seemed like a narrow crack winding through them. Ollie reached out and gathered a handful of the drooping yellow blossoms. The pony was tied behind, carrying her big saddle, and tossing her head about, and showing that she was very suspicious of the whole proceedings, and especially of a small flag which Ollie had fastened to the top of the wagon-cover, and which fluttered in the fresh morning breeze. Snoozer slept on and never stirred. At last the road came to the river, and then followed close along beside its bank, which was only a foot or so high. Ollie was interested in watching the long grass which grew in the bottom of the stream and was brushed all in one direction by the sluggish current, like the silky fur of some animal. After a while we came to a gravelly place which was a ford, and crossed the stream, stopping to let the horses drink. The water was only a foot deep. As we came upon the higher ground beyond the river we met the south wind squarely, and it came in at the front of the cover with a rush. We heard a sharp flutter behind, and then the wagon gave a shiver and a lurch, and the horses stopped; then there was another shock and lurch, and it rolled back a few inches.

"There," exclaimed Jack, "some of those wheels have begun to turn backwards! I told you!"

I looked back. Our puckering-string had given way, and the rear of the cover had blown out loosely. This had been more than the pony could stand, and she had broken her rope and run back a dozen rods, and stood snorting and looking at the wagon.

"First accident," I cried. "She'll run home, and we'll have to go back after her."

"Perhaps we can get around her," said Jack. "We'll try."

We left Ollie to hold the horses, and I went out around among the sunflowers, while Jack stood behind the wagon with his hat half full of oats. I got beyond her at last, and drove her slowly toward the wagon. She snorted and stamped the ground angrily with her forward feet; but at last she ventured to taste of the oats, and finding more in the feed-box on the rear of the wagon, she began eating them and forgot her fright.

"I guess we'd better not tie her, but let her follow," said Jack, "As soon as we have gone a little ways she'll come to think the wagon is home and stick to it."

"Yes," I said. "I think she is really as great a tramp as Snoozer, and just the pony for us."

"Are we all tramps?" asked Ollie.

"Well," said Jack, "I'm afraid Grandpa Oldberry thinks we don't lack much of it. He says varmints will catch us."

"Do you think they will?" went on Ollie, just a little bit anxiously.

"Oh, I guess not," said Jack. "You see, we've got four guns. Then there's Snoozer."

"But will they try to catch us?"

"Well, I don't know. Grandpa Oldberry says the varmints are awfully thick this fall."

"But what are varmints?"

"Oh, wolves, and b'ars, and painters, and--"

"What are painters?"

"Grandpa means panthers, I guess. Then there's Injuns, and boss-thieves, and--"

"There's a prairie-chicken," I cried, as one rose up out of the long grass.

"Perhaps we can get one for dinner," said Jack.

He took his gun and went slowly toward where the other had been. Another whirred away like a shot. Jack fired, but missed it. We started on, leaving the pony tossing her head and stamping her feet in a great passion on account of the report of the gun; but when she saw that we paid no attention to her and were rapidly going out of sight she turned, after taking a long look back at distant Prairie Flower, and came trotting along the road, with her stirrups dangling at her sides, and soon was following close behind.

"We can depend on the life-boat," said Jack.

Before we realized it the chronometer showed that it was almost noon. By this time we had left the sea of sunflowers and crept over the wrinkle at the western edge of the valley, and were off across the rolling prairie itself. Still Snoozer never stirred.

"I wonder when he'll wake up?" said Ollie.

"You'll see him awake enough at dinner-time," said Jack.

"Well, you'll see me awake enough then, too," answered Ollie. "I'm hungry."

"We hardy pioneers plunging into the trackless waste of a new and unexplored country never eat but one meal a day," said Jack. "And that's always raw meat--b'ar-meat, generally."

"Well," said Ollie, "I don't see any b'ar-meat, or even prairie-chicken-meat. Why didn't you hit the prairie-chicken, Uncle Jack?"

"I'm not used to shooting at such small game," answered Jack, solemnly. "My kind of game is b'ar--b'ar and other varmints."

Just then we passed a house, and down a little way from it, close to the road, was a well.

"Here's a good place to have dinner," said Jack; so we drove out by the side of the road and stopped.

"If I'm to be cook," said Jack to me, "then you've got to take care of the horses and do all the outside work. I'll be cook; you'll be rancher. That's what we'll call you--rancher. Rancher, feed the horses and look out for hoss-thieves and sich like cut-throats."

I unhitched the horses, tied them behind the wagon, and gave them some oats and corn in the feed-box. The pony I fed in the big tin pail near by. The grass beside the road was so dry, and it was so windy, that we decided that it was not safe to build a fire out-doors, so Jack cooked pancakes over the oil-stove inside. These with some cold meat he handed out to Ollie and me as we sat on the wagon-tongue, while he sat on the dash-board. We were half-way through dinner when we heard a peculiar whine, followed by a low bark, in the wagon, and then Snoozer leaped out, stretched himself, and began to wag his tail so fast that it looked exactly like a whirling feather duster. We fed him on pancakes, and he ate so many that if Jack had not fried some more we'd have certainly gone hungry.

"I told you he was a true tramp," said Jack. "Just see his appetite."

After we had finished, and the horses had grazed about on the dry grass some time, we started on. We hoped to reach a little lake which we saw marked on the map, called Lake Lookout, for the night camp; so we hurried along, it being a good distance ahead. All the afternoon we were passing between either great fields where the wheat had been cut, leaving the stubble, or beside long stretches of prairie. There were a few houses, many of them built of sod. Not much happened during the afternoon. Ollie followed the example of Snoozer, and curled up on the bed and had a long nap. We saw a few prairie-chickens, but did not try to shoot any of them. The pony trotted contentedly behind. Just before night I rode her ahead looking for the lake. I found it to be a small one, perhaps a half-mile wide, scarcely below the level of the prairie, and generally with marshy shores, though on one side the beach was sandy and stony, with a few stunted cottonwood-trees, and here I decided we would camp. I went back and guided the Rattletrap to the spot. Soon Jack had a roaring fire going from the dry wood which Ollie had collected. I fed the horses and turned them loose, and they began eagerly on the green grass which grew on the damp soil near the lake. The pony I picketed with a long rope and a strap around one of her forward ankles, between her hoof and fetlock, as we scarcely felt like trusting her all night. Snoozer got up for his supper, and after that stretched himself by the fire and blinked at it sleepily. The rest of us did much the same. After a while Ollie said:

"I think that bed in the wagon looks pretty narrow for two. How are three going to sleep in it?"

"I don't think three are going to sleep in it," said Jack.

"Where are you going to sleep, then, Uncle Jack?"

Jack laughed. "I think," he said, "that the rancher and the cook will sleep in the wagon and let you sleep under the wagon. Nothing makes a boy grow like sleeping rolled up in a blanket under a wagon. You'll be six inches taller if you do it every night till we get back."

"Well, I don't think so," said Ollie, just a little alarmed at the prospect. "I'd prefer to sleep in the wagon. Maybe what Grandpa Oldberry said about wild animals is so. You say you like to shoot 'em, so you stay outside and do it--I don't."

At last it was arranged that Ollie and I should sleep inside and Jack under the wagon. We were surprised to find how early we were ready for bed. The long ride and the fresh air had given us an appetite for sleep. So we soon turned in, the dog staying outside with Jack.

"Good-night, Uncle Jack," called Ollie, as we put out the lantern and covered up in the narrow bed. "Look out for painters."

I was almost asleep when Ollie shook me, and whispered, "What's that noise?"

I listened, and heard a regular, hollow, booming sound, something like the very distant discharge of cannon.

"It's the horses walking on the ground--always sounds that way in the night," I answered.

Again I was almost asleep when Ollie took hold of my arm, and said, "What's that?"

I once more listened, and recognized a peculiar creaking noise as that made by the horses cropping off the grass. I explained to Ollie, and then dropped off sound asleep. I don't know how long it was, but after some time I was again roused up by a nervous shake.

"Listen to _that_," whispered Ollie. "What can it be?"

I sat up cautiously and listened. It was a strange, rattling, unearthly sound which I could not account for any better than Ollie.

"It's a bear," he whispered. "I heard them make that noise at the park back home."