378 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING 
To be ready for the opportunities the sportsman must 
be quiet, and never relax his vigilance, and his gun 
must be so held that it can instantly be brought into 
position to shoot. The nerves of the shooter must be 
constantly at a high tension in readiness for the rise 
of the bird and the instantaneous shot. Every faculty 
must be at a high key. The very moment that the 
shooter relaxes his attention will be the moment that 
the bird will rise, and before the sportsman can get 
ready the opportunity is gone. It will be seen that 
the man who dawdles with his gun, who is slow in 
the handling of it, or who is noisy, cannot hope for 
any satisfactory success in shooting the bird of game 
birds, the ruffed grouse. On the other hand, he can be 
keyed up to too high a pitch, overready when the bird 
rises. A nervous flurry does nearly as much to disar- 
range the desired results as does the more indolent 
dawdling. There are those, however, who can never 
overcome the nervous start at the roar of the bird’s 
wings, though they may be perfectly undisturbed in 
any other bird shooting. 
And the skill of the shooter, be it ever so high in 
degree, must be supplemented by the work of a quiet, 
well trained, industrious, intelligent dog, for the 
shooter is much better off without any dog at all than 
with one that is riotous or one that ranges too far or 
that is heedless of his work. Loud orders to the dog 
have no place in ruffed grouse shooting. The sports- 
man himself cannot observe too great a silence. The 
human voice alarms and puts the birds to flight. 
