[Chaps. XIV & XV, 

 79 PAjiAS. 44 & 45.] 



bat withstand temptation and look in the direc- 

 tion that gives your eyes a chance. Have an 

 intelligent loader, or orderly, in the butt witli 

 you, and tell liini to look out too, but don't 

 let him make you turn round to attempt the 

 impossible. 



(c) Don't, disdain the vse of certain Utile aids, such 

 OS good periscopic glare-glasses, etc., etc. The 

 pbysical strain imposed by a long day's butt- 

 filiooting is very great. Your gun-barrels will 

 get uncomfortably hot. Wear an old glove on 

 your left hand, or slip over the barrels one of 

 the neat shields that the shops supply. Your 

 gun is supposed to be a correct fit, but you may 

 have a short, stumpy trigger finger or some 

 special vice that leads to chipped joints, etc., a 

 small point, but one that may make things 

 unnecessarily uncomfortable. Here again the 

 shops supply cunning contrivances of rubber 

 and leather and you can select. Shooting 

 should be a pleasure. "Why," then, what 

 suits you best as the advertisements of the 

 Patent Medicines say, " suffer pain ?"' 



CHAPTER XV. 



Hints on Organising and Arranging 

 a Duck Drive. 



45. For Duck shooting of the kind described in this || R'?y " ,^"'^ 

 book, the water, or waters, should be very carefully selected, jhfeh. 

 A great number of considerations enter into the question. 

 On some lakes Duck are to be found by day, on others by 

 night (see the Chapter on Feeding Habits) ; few waters 

 will retain their birds both by day and night. If one has 

 to deal with a jheel on which the birds only stop by day, 

 it is best to start shooting about 10 to 11 A.M. and 

 continue as long as the birds remain, because a time will 

 come in tlie afternoon when they will leave, for good, for 

 the waters on whicli they feed at night. All who have 

 closely shot any particular neighbourhood will know that, 

 if one goes out at daybreak, one will find duck on small, 

 shallow bits of water which they leave for the larger ^7t(;f/6- 

 when disturbed either by the early sportsman or by 

 country folk, cattle, etc., after they get abroad in the 

 morning. It is for feeding that the birds have visited the 

 little ponds ; it is for refuge that they seek the bigger 



