Introductory, 1 5 



shot, and books of instruction are not for 

 you. It can be done, and in the doing of 

 it with the incredible swiftness necessary, 

 and its infinite variations of position, eleva- 

 tion, surroundings, &c., lies the whole pleas- 

 ure of the sport. 



Nay! not the whole pleasure. Even if 

 Mr Snipe beats you every time, until you 

 distrust your trusty gun, and curse the 

 maker of the cartridges you secretly know 

 to be perfectly correct, until you call your- 

 self names for having been such a fool as 

 to bring your dog, or, being without one, 

 blaspheme your folly in leaving him at 

 home — even under these harrowing con- 

 ditions there will still be a keen pleasure 

 in the midst of your failure. There is 

 the pleasure of the lonely moor, the mon- 

 otonous grandeur of the sombre levels which 

 are the snipe's chosen haunts. There is 

 the ghostliness of the vast marshes, here 

 and there shaking and quivering as if they 

 knew not for certain which to be, earth 

 or water, whose spell makes Bond Street 



