GREAT FUN FOR A BOY 81 



wisdom. All the time I could steal from my lessons 

 (for I was not quite a Pawnee) I spent in this edify- 

 ing manner ; at length I was fully initiated in all 

 the mysteries of sporting by a relation, himself the 

 prince of sportsmen, who took a fancy to me. The 

 reason was as follows : — 



In the depth of winter, the ground being 

 smothered with snow, and the blast bitter, I 

 followed him out a wild -fowl shooting. I was 

 devoid of hat, an article that I looked upon as 

 superfluous, and that I always lost or mislaid as 

 soon as it was given me. Equipped I was in white 

 cotton stockings ; and my shoes, which were of the 

 thinnest, I had tied to my feet with a string which 

 passed over the instep. I could not put them up 

 at heel with any comfort, because I had large 

 chilblains there, which were broke. At length, 

 after creeping a space on my gloveless hands and 

 knees in the snow, and under cover of some sedge 

 and willow bushes, up flew some wild ducks before 

 my patron. " Quack, quack ! " — down came one 

 to his shot, and fell with a splash into the river. 

 In I plunged after him like a Newfoundland dog : 

 you might have heard the flounce in a still day at 

 Chippenham, about six miles off. The duck not 

 being dead, made a swim and a dive of it. Long 

 and dubious was the chase ; but in the end I de- 

 scried his bill amongst the sedges, where he had 

 poked it up to take a little breath. Making a 

 dexterous snatch, I seized him underneath by the 

 legs — Chinese fashion, with the exception of the 

 pumpkin — and drew him loud quacking to the 

 bank. When landed I squeezed my clothes a little, 



G 



