Secondly, there is a short addition from the scientific 

 point of view, which is contributed by one of the very best 

 authorities on ballistics. 



The writer has had many opportunities of watching 

 most of the best game shots in England shooting at high 

 pheasants and grouse, and so far as his observation goes 

 the most successful performers at very high birds seem to 

 wait until the bird is almost straight above their heads, 

 and then chuck their guns and fire. 



With regard to the actual height at which pheasants 

 can be killed, there are two trees in Lord Darnley's park 

 at Cobham Hall, Kent — one of these is 1 16 feet high 

 and the other is, I believe, about \ 30 feet high. 



Over the first tree, behind which the ground falls con- 

 siderably, very many pheasants have been killed clean 

 and well, which shows that provided one shoots forward 

 enough there is plenty of penetration in the shot to kill 

 at this height. 1 have also been told that pheasants have 

 flown over the higher tree and been killed. 



On one occasion, in the West of England, pheasants 

 were driven off the side of a hill across a valley and over 

 another hill into a wood on the further side. The guns 

 were standing in the valley (A). The birds rose at D and 

 flew across the next hill at C, which they cleared by some 

 8 to 1 2 feet (as there were "stops" standing there) and 

 made their way into covert at E, B being approximately 

 the line of flight. 



The writer, knowing these high birds of old, had 

 brought a surveying aneroid in his pocket, and having set 

 it at A, and proceeding to C, the latter point was found 

 to be 116 feet above A. Therefore any bird that cleared 



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