THE PINNATED GKOUSE. 'J'5 



'' What a pity you lost that one," I said, in a consola- 

 tory tone. 



"It is not lost," was the answer. "It has gone to- 

 wards the ridge, where we may find it, as I gave it a 

 dose of No. 10, and it must be badly hit. 



I had been using No. 8 shot, and thought it light enough 

 for prairie chickens even at that season, so I suggested 

 that she ought to try it, but she quietly said that No. 

 9 or 10 was heavy enough, as the birds were young, 

 tardy in flushing, and laid well to the dogs; and as she 

 seemed to know more about the matter than I did, I de- 

 cided that I had been somewhat hasty in giving advice. 



After the dogs had found the dead birds, she said she 

 had marked down the flushed brood near the top of the 

 ridge, but that it would be better to beat in the direction 

 they had taken than to drive there rapidly, as the inter- 

 vening space was, no doubt, well stocked with game. 

 Acting on her suggestion, I followed the dogs m the car- 

 riage, and whenever they came to a point I stepped out, 

 fluslied the bird, and, owing to its tameness, generally 

 bagged it, as its flight was rather slow and straight ahead, 

 and it seldom rose until I was within a few feet of it. 

 The veriest tyro could, of course, grass his chickens un- 

 der such circumstances, for very few of them required 

 the second barrel. The few birds that did not fall at the 

 first shot were those which flew quartering, and received 

 the iron hail in the posterior instead of the anterior 

 part of the body, but only a small number of these es- 

 caped, owing to the closeness to which they allowed us 

 to approach ere they took to flight. We worked the 

 ground as far as the crest of a high ridge which was 

 crowned by a cornfield, a distance of three or four miles, 

 and shot nearly all the way, as the birds rose singly or 

 m small packs, and flew only a few hundred yards before 

 alighting again. It took us about two hours to go that 

 distance, and when we halted near the maize field, about 



