142 The Grouse Family 



the level, the ruffed rascal is a startling menace 

 against the pure joy of the great subsequent. 



What he will see probably will resemble a 

 brown streak which curves over the rim of the 

 height and fairly sizzles valleyward in a peculiar 

 zigzagging, downward boring, which he is apt to 

 hope will result fatally, yet which seldom does. 

 To swing a gun three ways at once is a serious 

 task for ordinary hands — in the writer's opinion 

 a man-of-war with all hands busy couldn't do 

 it — yet the hill-grouse of Pennsylvania will 

 unblushingly ask a newcomer to do this very 

 thing. And when a bird of chance flies into the 

 hail of lead, one's triumph is too brief to talk 

 about. When you hit one, you hit it fair, and the 

 jar lifts it just enough to send it clear of every- 

 thing, down and down till it fetches up either in 

 some impetuous and thoughtless trout-stream 

 which will rush it a mile away before you can 

 clamber down to where it fell, or else it will land 

 in some Dutchman's field which is "posted." 

 Then you have to go home and learn Dutch be- 

 fore you can explain to the owner of the land 

 why you are trespassing, and when you get back 

 the late owner's grandson is working the farm, 

 and he insists that all claims against the estate 

 were settled by his father years before he died. 



Or if, as sometimes happens, you actually 

 gather the bird before it gets too high, you look 



