28 UPLAND SHOOTING. 



or by succeeding boats; and such has been our own not 

 unf requent experience. If the wind and weather be calm 

 and adverse, there will probably be but a small flight of 

 fowl; but if a light or a smart breeze blows from the east- 

 ward, then " look out to the eastward." The first fifteen 

 or twenty boats to arrive anchor and set out decoys, and 

 then form a curved line from the outer rock, at about 

 gunshot distance from each other. Those who come later 

 form a second line, anchored some thirty rods in rear of 

 the former; and all the latest comers, who have lingered 

 too long in bed or at breakfast, form a straggling third 

 line in rear of all, and are content to open fire upon the 

 broken flocks that have escaped through the two front 

 lines, and ofttirnes they are rewarded in picking up the 

 cripples. On a blowy day, with a rough sea running, these 

 third : line laggards do a profitable business in gathering 

 up the killed and wounded. These coot-shooters form a 

 mixed and curious assemblage. Some of them are city- 

 bred, fresh from the wharf and warehouse, rigged out in 

 the most correct sporting-garb, and armed in the best 

 fashion. Then there are rural gunners from the far-back- 

 in woods, provided with squirrel-guns, and using only 3 B 

 shot, instead of No. 2 and 3. Then come the native 

 gunners, old fellows who have followed the sport at the 

 shore where they reside for half a century or more. We 

 have known some of them, venerable with the frosts of 

 eighty years, yet strong enough to pull a boat or thin a 

 flock, using only their ancient muskets. In a favorable 

 day for the flight, it is exciting to take one's stand on a 

 bluff and witness the sport. It is like overlooking a battle- 

 field, with constant roar and flash of guns. A light breeze, 

 then, perhaps, blows from the northeast, just sufficient to 

 ruffle the waves, without stirring them to anger. The 

 rolling surge frets and foams against the weed-draped 

 rocks and the yellow sands of the shore, where the dark 



