i;o AN EAST COAST NATURALIST 



Curlews, the moment before merrily piping and 

 feeding on a mud flat, is not to me edifying. Nor 

 are the records of "big" shots ever anything but 

 distasteful. An old gunner, with seeming pride, 

 told me that his biggest shot secured him 285 

 Dunlins and 5 Wigeon. He did not count the 

 cripples that fluttered away. These birds were 

 crowded together on a huge slab of floating ice, and 

 it cost him some labour to force his gun punt through 

 the pack in order to make this shot. 



Some years ago an old gunner, lying with his boat 

 in a wake in the ice, while waiting for wildfowl, 

 settled himself to eat his dinner. A brilliantly 

 plumaged Kingfisher, the best he had ever set eyes 

 upon (and which is now said to be in Norwich 

 Museum), alighted on the extreme end of his punt 

 gun. He longed to secure the bird, but having no 

 " hand gun, 11 he was puzzled to know how to effect 

 a capture. It suddenly occurred to him that the 

 " vibration, 11 as he termed it, of a discharge might 

 kill the bird ; so he stealthily, inch by inch, reached 

 towards the trigger, which he managed at length to 

 pull. The gun went off with a roar, and dead as 

 a stone dropped the poor little Kingfisher into the 

 water beneath. 



