Part 18

To insure a good day's pheasant-shooting, thoroughly trained beaters are absolutely necessary; and it is equally needful that the guns should remain where they are posted, or if they are to move, only do so exactly as the head-keeper directs. Nothing is more annoying, both to master and keeper, than having a good day spoiled because two or three of the guns will get together to hear or tell the last new story, and consequently let the pheasants escape by not being at their proper posts. If you have the good fortune to be placed by the net at the end of the beat, you will find that, besides having the best place for sport, great amusement can be derived by noticing the behaviour of the various kinds of game as they come up to it. Soon after you have taken your position, the rattle of sticks is heard, showing that the beat has begun, and shortly a suppressed shout indicates that a rabbit is up; for the best-trained beaters in England cannot resist giving a shout at the sight of one, and if they are a scratch lot, the yells that greet its appearance could not be exceeded if half a dozen foxes had been unkennelled at once. They will allow a pheasant or woodcock or, in fact, any other kind of game, to get away silently; but a rabbit is too much for them--why, I do not know; but such is the fact. In a short time something may be heard coming very rapidly towards the net, and in a minute a splendid old cock-pheasant appears, who runs right up to it; then, suddenly catching sight of you, back he goes like a racehorse, and you hear the whirr as he rises on meeting the line of beaters, and the cry of "Mark back," succeeded as a rule by two rapid shots, sometimes only by a single one, followed by a crash as he comes down through the trees. Next a lot of hen-pheasants come pattering along, crouching as they run with outstretched neck. These come up very quietly, and begin to examine the net closely, walking along it, trying whether they can find a place to pass underneath, and, if they do, they infallibly lead all the rest away; but, failing this, they squat down and become at once almost invisible; so exactly does their plumage assimilate itself to the dead leaves that, unless you happen to catch their eye, you would never detect them. Then come a lot of young cocks in a terrible flurry, running here, there, and everywhere, occasionally twisting round like teetotums; these, too, at length squat, picking out tufts of brake or grass, where their dark heads are covered, and their back and long tail-feathers just match the stuff they are lying in. Presently some hares come along, and these are all listening so intently to the beaters, and looking back as well, that they blunder against the net, greatly to their astonishment; for they sit up and stare at it, and then trot away to see if they can make off by one of their visual runs; failing in this, they lie down in some of the thickest cover, hoping to escape by this plan. Numerous rabbits come hopping along, and, meeting the net, turn and hide themselves in stumps or any other place they can find. And really, as the beaters come nearer and nearer, you would never imagine the quantity of game there is; a novice would at once declare there was none, so absolutely motionless does it remain until it is forced up; and then, although you have been at the post all the time, the quantity seems quite astonishing. Pheasants begin to whirr up, at first by twos and threes, and then almost by scores at a time, and the firing is incessant; it seems now that every tuft of grass or piece of fern has a pheasant under it; but in spite of the beaters, several old cocks run back between them, being far too clever to rise and be shot at, knowing that a beater may almost as well strike at a flash of lighting as at an old cock running.

I may here remark that some of these old cocks will often escape being killed season after season by some dodge or other. In a cover of my own there was an old cock-pheasant who lived between six and seven years, always escaping the guns. We used to drive this cover regularly to the same point, and just before the beaters had finished, this old fellow would get up close to the outside hedge, rising above the underwood as if he would give an excellent shot; but, just as you thought he was as good as bagged, closing his wings, he would drop into the field close to the hedge, turn round, and run back like a racer, hopping over the fence again into the cover just behind the beaters. He practised this dodge successfully for several years; but at length the keeper complained so much that he disturbed the cover, and would not let any other bird come near, that I had to devise means to kill him, which was effected by driving the cover the opposite way to which he was accustomed. The old fellow was so bewildered that he rose, gave a fair shot, and was killed. A more splendid bird than he was could scarcely have been seen--in full plumage, a broad and perfect white ring round his neck, and spurs an inch long, and as sharp and hard as if they had been made of iron.

Very amusing it is, too, to watch the shooters. There stands one man, picking his birds, and dreading a miss for the sake of his reputation; here is a greedy shot, firing at everything, blowing much of his game to pieces, for fear anyone else should get a shot; and again, there is the keeper's horror and detestation--a man who sends off his birds wounded, as a rule hitting them, but very seldom killing one clean, with the exception of those that he utterly annihilates. Lookers-on are apt to laugh at sportsmen for missing pheasants, so large do they look, and such apparently easy shots do they give; and until a person tries himself, he has no idea how fast they really do fly, or how easy it is to miss them.

Rabbit-shooting is capital sport; indeed, none can be better for affording sport to a large Christmas-party in the country. Everybody enjoys it, and brightens up at the idea, from the schoolboy home for the holidays--who has been in and out of the house scores of times already to see how the weather looked, whether the beagles would be ready, or on some other wonderful pretext--to the old sportsman, who did not know whether he should come, but cannot resist the temptation, merely trying at first to save his dignity by saying he should just come and see if any woodcocks were sprung, and ending in being as enthusiastic about it as the youngest. The "form" displayed by the shooters is diverse. There is the elderly gentleman who gets away by himself to a quiet corner, and is found at lunch-time with three or four mangled rabbits, none of them having been more than a couple of yards from his gun when they were shot. Then there is the man who will always fire both barrels; if he misses with the first, of course he tries with his second; but if he does hit the first time, discharges the second barrel as a sort of salute in honour of his successful first. And here is an amateur--this one usually a schoolboy or 'Varsity man--who fires at whatever he gets the slightest glimpse of; a robin flitting about amongst the brambles is safe to have a shot fired at it; and indeed the dogs, keepers, and shooters have all, in their turns, very narrow escapes from this gentleman: the position he has held is well and distinctly marked by the cut-down underwood and well-peppered trunks of trees. Then there is the sportsman, generally a great swell, who fires at everything he sees in the distance, and claims all game killed within a radius of a quarter of a mile. He cannot be induced to shoot at a rabbit or any game within a reasonable distance, his excuse always being, "Choke-bore, my dear fellow--blow it to bits;" the fact being that he never hits anything except by accident, and fancies by this plan that he is not detected.

I once saw a capital trick played on a person of this kind by a couple of mischievous schoolboys. They procured a dead rabbit, and fixed it firmly in a lifelike position by means of sticks, &c.; then tying a long piece of string to each foreleg, they went and ensconced themselves behind two large trees in the cover, one on each side of the road, about seventy yards from the gentleman's stand. Putting down the rabbit, one of them drew it slowly across the road, the other giving a shout, which made their friend look round and immediately shoot at it, when the string was jerked and the rabbit fell on its side. Whilst he was reloading and fiddling with his gun, the rabbit was drawn away, and in a short time the game was played again; in the end about twenty shots were fired at it by the victim, not one of which touched it, and the string was only cut once. When lunch-time came, and the keeper went round to collect the rabbits, he was saluted by the gentleman with:

"Well, Smith, got my eye in to-day. Never saw such a gun; killed at least thirty rabbits straight off crossing the road up there. Must have been one of their regular runs."

Off went the keeper to pick them up, and of course detected the trick at once. His good manners would not allow him to laugh there; so he had to make a bolt for it, and, to my great surprise, I saw this staid and serious head-keeper burst through the cover into the ride I was in, and begin to shout with laughter in the most uproarious manner. For a moment I thought he had gone mad, and on walking up to him could get nothing out of him, except between his fits of laughter, "Beg pardon, sir, but them 'limbs,' them two 'limbs!'" At last he got sufficiently calm to tell me what had occurred, and I need hardly say that I laughed almost as heartily. The indignation of the victim was great when he discovered the trick, and he stalked off to the house at once; and perhaps it was well that he did, for the two young scamps' account of the whole thing was enough to send anyone into fits. It is needless to say that they ever after occupied the foremost place in the keeper's affections.

It is, indeed, a very pretty sight to see a pack of beagles working in cover. How they try every tuft of grass or rushes! Soon you notice that they are working more eagerly, and some begin to lash their tails, and suddenly out bolts "bunny" from his seat, sure to be saluted by a hasty shot from some one, not the least to its detriment, but a very narrow escape for the leading dogs. Away go the pack, making the woods ring with their tongues. Excited individuals race after them, often with their guns on full cock, and their fingers on the trigger. What their ideas may be in this performance is difficult to say, but I suppose it is the effect of that temporary insanity that seizes many people at the sight of a rabbit. As a rabbit invariably runs a ring, and returns to its starting-place, there is not the least use, except for the sake of the exercise, in trying to follow it; and the first one put up is safe to run his ring, as the good shots will not fire at him, that the youngsters may have a chance, and the indifferent shots are sure to miss the first through excitement. You hear plenty of shots whilst the dogs are running, as other rabbits, frightened by their noise and passage, bolt from their seats and scuttle about everywhere. Besides these, a few old cock-pheasants, who have strayed from the preserves, are sure to be found and shot. You shortly hear a shot from the cover the rabbit was found in, followed by "Who-whoop!" showing that the hunted one has been killed.

The keeper then begins to draw afresh, and you may notice that certain of the older sportsmen are very attentive to the hounds whilst drawing, the reason being, as is soon evident, that they hope a woodcock may be flushed, and their hopes are usually realised. If you mark one beagle poking about by himself, sniffing along, evidently on scent, yet not opening, you may be pretty sure he is on a woodcock. But very soon another rabbit is found, and away goes the pack, this time not quite so steadily, as the number of rabbits up tempt the younger hounds after them. However, this adds (except in the opinion of the staid elders) to the sport; and soon, by the noise of the beagles' tongues and the rapid shooting, it appears as if every hound had a rabbit to himself. There certainly must be some "sweet little cherub" sitting "up aloft," who protects rabbit-shooters and beagles, so reckless does the shooting always appear. Here you see an excited youth fire at a rabbit not a yard in front of the dog. How he manages to miss both seems incomprehensible, but he does. There another rushes round a corner, and blazes both barrels at one, just in a line with another gun, and only a few yards from him; but he escapes too. In a word, rabbit-shooting with beagles is one of the most amusing, but at the same time one of the most dangerous, sports going.

The advance of civilisation and cultivation has almost entirely spoiled snipe and wild-fowl shooting. In the districts where, thirty years ago, ducks might be found by dozens and snipe in swarms, the former are extinct; and as for the latter, if there happens to be one, it flies off before you are within half a mile of it, as if it was ashamed of being seen in such a place. I well remember the capital shooting I used to get in Berkshire. There was a large swampy common of several hundred acres, all rough sedgy grass and rushes; on one side was a wide ditch full of twists and turns, with high reedy banks, and at the further end a narrow tributary of the Thames, with beds of water-rushes on both sides; and on the other side were acres of small meadows of from six to ten acres, divided by high hawthorn hedges and deep wide ditches. It was a real "happy hunting-ground" for anyone fond of the sport, and many have been the long days that I and my retriever passed on it. The common itself was invariably full of snipe, and they behaved themselves properly in those days, not rising and going off in whisps directly you appeared, but trying to be shot at decently, like respectable birds. Then the ditch and river were sure to hold ducks; and after you had hunted the common, it was very exciting work, creeping up the various well-known curves and turns in the ditch, where the ducks usually remained, my dog creeping after me, quite as much interested as I was myself, and showing most wonderful intelligence in avoiding stepping on any little pieces of thin ice or anything that would make a noise; then the careful look over the bank, and if the stalk had been successful, the rapid double shot at the ducks, as they rose with a rush, followed by the drop of killed or wounded, if the shot had been lucky, and the subsequent hunt after the cripples, if unfortunately there were any, for nothing on earth is so difficult to get as a wounded duck. The way they will dive, and the time they can keep under water, only rising and putting the tip of their beak up to get air, and the extraordinary places they get into, will puzzle the best retriever, and weary out his master's patience, unless he has a very large stock of that, or obstinacy, in his composition. But very often, when I peered cautiously over the bank, the ducks could just be seen swimming away down a further reach of the ditch, making for the larger stream below, and then it was a race as to which should get there first, as the cunning birds knew as well as I did that if they once got there, and into the reed-beds, they were comparatively safe. It was no joke, running as hard as you could go, in a stooping position, for several hundred yards; and often they would escape me, an unfortunate step on a piece of thin ice, or a stick, making them rise, and I then had the pleasure of seeing them fly off and drop into a reed-bed half a mile off, which I could not get at.

I had often been warned that the ditch was dangerous, and proved it on one occasion, very nearly to my cost. Some ducks dropped into a rushy pool in a field on the opposite side of it, and as I should have had a walk of a mile to get round to them, I determined to try and cross, fortunately for myself selecting a place where there was a stout young willow; so putting down my gun, and catching firm hold of the tree, I put one leg into the ditch, and soon found, though it passed down through the mud above my knee, that no bottom was to be found, and on trying to withdraw it, discovered that my leg was fixed as if in a vice. Fortunately the willow was strong, and having one leg on the bank, after pulling until I thought the other must be dislocated, I succeeded in extricating myself.

But the meadows on the further side were where the best sport used to be got. These, as I have said, were divided by large hawthorn hedges fully twelve feet high, and intersected by deep ditches full of reeds, with an open pool here and there. The meadows, too, had narrow gutters cut in them to act as drains, I believe, and these abounded with snipe; and after you had flushed the common ones, if you hunted carefully a good many jacks could be found. The ditches were very good for ducks. By help of the hedges you could get up to them unperceived, and many a fine mallard I got here. Hares were also fond of the rough grass, and partridges might usually be found in the middle of the day. I remember bagging one December day six and a half couple of ducks, eleven couple of snipe, besides some jacks, three hares, and three and a half brace of birds. This does not sound much, but to me it was a thoroughly enjoyable day. No keeper following at one's heels, full of advice, but just going where and how I pleased; then the successful stalk after ducks, and the unexpected luck with partridges and hares, in addition to the snipe, have indelibly impressed this day on my memory. Being in this neighbourhood a short time ago, I went down to look at my favourite ground, and found that the large marshy common, with a few donkeys and some wretched cows trying to get a living off it, had been drained, and subdivided by neat post and rail fences, and sheep were grazing where snipe used to abound. The only thing unchanged was the old ditch. I suppose it is all right, but I prefer the ducks and snipe.

Many years ago very fair duck-shooting, and some snipe as well, might be got on the Thames between Marlow and Windsor, and this was a very luxurious kind of wild-fowl shooting; for all you had to do was to hire a punt and a good puntsman who knew the river well, and, wrapping yourself up comfortably in a warm coat, drop down the river, going into the quiet back waters and round the eyot-beds. In favourable weather a good many ducks might be found, and it was curious to notice how they would hide themselves under the banks where they were undermined by the stream, and the roots of the osiers hung down. An old mallard would constantly stay until fairly poked out; and often when you thought you had tried them thoroughly, after you left an old fellow would rise and go quacking off. The eyot-beds were favourite places for snipe; but you could not do much with these unless with a steady old dog, who would poke slowly all over the place, the stumps and stalks of the osiers entirely preventing any walking. But now, I believe, this style of shooting is at an end.

My last attempt at duck-shooting was very exciting, in fact rather too much so. A friend, who knew my weakness for it, wrote and asked me to come to his house, as I could get capital flight-shooting close to his place. Of course I went, and in the evening we started for the river, which was much flooded, and embarking in a boat, I was soon landed on a small mound in the middle of the floods, about twelve feet square, and was told it was a first-rate place, as the ducks, in their flight from some large ponds about five miles off, always passed over it. I was also told I might be sure to know when they were coming by the flashes of the guns of other wild fowlers on the banks some miles away. A whistle was given me to signal for the boat when I wanted it, and I was left alone in my glory. It was very cold, and my island was too small for exercise. Soon a flash caught my eye, and then the report of a gun fired some miles off came to my ears, soon followed by a succession of flashes and reports from gunners posted along each side of the river. The effect was very pretty, and I admired it greatly, until an idea struck me that there might be guns posted on the bank behind. Just then some ducks came along, and I fired rapidly at them; almost simultaneously came two reports from the bank, and some heavy charges of shot cut up the water all round; in addition something weighty struck the ground just in my rear, covering me with mud. Instantly blowing my whistle, the boat soon came, and on landing I saw two men, one of whom coming up asked me where I had been. I told him "on the mound"; to which he rejoined, "Was you, really? Lor, now, if I didn't think it was the miller's old donkey! and, thinks I, if the aggravating old beast gets there, a shot or two won't hurt un, and teach him not to get there again; so I lets 'goo' when the ducks comes along. There, and so 'twas you, sir; lor, now, to think of that!" and the old fellow went off into a series of chuckles.

His gun was an extraordinary one--a single barrel, something like four feet long, about eight bore. I asked what charge he put in, and he showed me a measure that held at least four drachms of powder, and another that would contain about three ounces of number two shot. This was how he loaded, and in addition, he said, he always put in a couple of pistol-shots--"they did bring anything down so sweet that they hit." So these were the pleasant things I heard strike the ground just behind me. I went home at once, thankful that I had not been bagged.

End of Project Gutenberg's Sporting Society, Vol. I (of 2), by Various