150 GAME-BIKDS AT HOME. 



So I reasoned as I flew across the fields for 

 more ammunition. The scarlet of the catch-fly 

 and the opening bloom of the golden-rod seemed 

 a stream of fireworks from my speed, and it was 

 but a few minutes before I was returning out of 

 breath. 



Only a few steps beyond where I had picked up 

 my first bird, a faint haze of gray mottled with 

 brown and black rose out of the corn with that 

 mysterious note that always raised havoc in my 

 young nerves. It brought my gun so quickly to 

 my shoulder that before I knew it off it went. 

 So did the gray, speeding away upward, and 

 joined farther on by two new lines of gray amid 

 a full chorus of strange melody. Where is an- 

 other such moment as when you glance along the 

 gun and see for a twinkling that you have raised 

 it on the exact spot where it should be? In a 

 second more I saw the gray clear-cut against the 

 distant sky and in exact line with the gun. It 

 vanished for an instant in the smoke of my 

 second barrel, to appear below in a soft whirl of 

 gray, white, and brown gyrating to earth, while 

 its two companions sped away on high, their 



