LATE PINNATED-GROUSE SHOOTING. 75 



der I have often shot away a pound of the 

 latter to get twenty-five or thirty birds. I fol- 

 lowed, in those days, the example of other 

 people, and used shot several sizes larger than 

 was necessary or proper. At that date we used 

 No. 1 or No. 2 in October and November, and I 

 believe I was one of the first to discover that with 

 No. 6, from a good gun, with a strong charge of 

 powder, the biggest cock-grouse that ever flew 

 could be brought to the bag. At the end of my 

 day's shooting at that period I used to have to 

 carry twenty-five or thirty grouse as well as the 

 gun for four or five miles, sometimes further. 

 This was no small matter. 



The October shooting of grouse, good as that 

 is, may be excelled, according to my notions, by 

 that in November. They generally lie in the 

 corn among the tumble-weed, so called from its 

 growing up and rolling over so as to form snug 

 cover ; and they are especially fond of lying in 

 the sod-corn, which is that grown upon the land 

 the first crop after the prairie is broken up. This 

 sod-corn does not grow up tall, as the corn on 

 older-tilled land does. In November the blades 

 of the corn are hanging down, wilted by the 

 frost. The stalks are shrunk. The dogs can 



