222 BASHFUL DRUMMERS. 



and after a little walked suddenly into plain 

 sight. We discovered each other at the 

 same instant. I kept motionless, my field- 

 glass up. He made sundry nervous move- 

 ments, especially of his ruff, and then si- 

 lently stalked away. 



I could not blame him for his lack of 

 neighborliness. If I had been shot at and 

 hunted with dogs as many times as he prob- 

 ably had been, I too might have become 

 a little shy of strangers. To my thinking, 

 indeed, the grouse is one of our most esti- 

 mable citizens. A liking for the buds of 

 fruit-trees is his only fault (not many of 

 my townsmen have a smaller number, I 

 fancy), and that is one easily overlooked, 

 especially* by a man who owns no orchard. 

 Every sportsman tries to shoot him, and 

 every winter does its worst to freeze or 

 starve him ; but he continues to flourish. 

 Others may migrate to sunnier climes, or 

 seek safety in the backwoods, but not so the 

 partridge. He was born here, and here he 

 means to stay. What else could be ex- 

 pected of a bird whose notion of a lover's 

 serenade is the beating of a drum ? 



