366 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING 
the tip of his nose visible above the ferns. As we came 
to him a bird rose like a rocket, only a yard from the 
dog, and whizzed upward as if bound for the stars. 
My triend’s first barrel decimated the banded feathers 
of its broad, outspread tail, and he caught it with his 
second barrel as it was speeding its bobtailed career 
high among the branches of the old oak trees. As it 
fell, another bustled, with riotous hubbub, almost from 
the same spot from which the last one rose, and wheel- 
ing, with its breast, mottled with black and white, in 
full view, cleft the breeze so fast that the shot from 
my gun was held back by the resistance of the air 
waves. At least that was my theory then, and it ought 
to suffice at this lapse of time. 
Some ten minutes passed away, and we found Frank 
anchored apparently to a stump in a little ravine far 
up the hillside, with Jack indorsing his draft on our 
confidence with his most statuesque attitude, about 
thirty yards behind him. The birch was waving in 
the breeze above him, and the ferns were swaying 
gently below his nose, the raspberries and blackberries 
were still bright on the bushes in the ravine, and the 
young oaks were as green as in the spring, but other 
signs of life there were none. We threw stones in 
ahead of the dog, but nothing moved. We tried to 
urge the dog to flush them, but he would not budge. 
At the risk of losing a shot I went in, for the ravine 
was deep and steep-sided. A few feet ahead of the 
dog I slipped and fell, and in a twinkling the sky 
above me seemed alive with roaring wings and meteors 
