62 The Life Worth Living 



fashioned rabbit-gum set skilfully in a path 

 along the hedgerow or in some deep shel- 

 tered glade. 



I believe in the gun for a normal boy. I 

 teach my boy to shoot with me when he is 

 so small he has to kneel and a number 

 twelve gun kicks him flat on his back. It's 

 funny to see a youngster pick himself up and 

 declare he "didn't feel it at all!" 



Narrow and poor is the child's life who 

 never roamed the fields alone with his dog 

 and a gun on his shoulder. He may make a 

 man without it, but he will not have an equal 

 chance with the boy whose heart has thrilled 

 with the elemental joy that links him to the 

 habits and instincts of four thousand years 

 of human history. The first man was a 

 hunter, a trapper and a fisherman. When 

 man ceases to care for these things, or de- 

 cries them, I fear that he is either sick, a 

 fool, or both. 



It is not true that it makes him cruel or 



