64 SHOOTING AND SALMON FISHING 



at a private tutor's at Runkel on the Lahn, in Nassau, many a 

 one the author has thus "potted." The Germans call it " Die 

 blat zeit," or the bleating time. The chief difficulty to the 

 beginner is the bleating, and though there are now wooden 

 calls made which anyone can bring into play by merely blow- 

 ing through them, in the days that we write of the only known 

 way was to produce the bleat by means of a birch leaf, and to 

 do this properly required long practice. Our old Jager Wilhelm 

 carried a pair of scissors to cut off the rough edges of the leaf, 

 and then doubling a small piece of it over the tips of the two 

 first fingers, he would apply it to his lips and produce the bleat 

 steadily. 



Many a day did we tramp to the forest in July and August, 

 and some place having been silently found where a buck had 

 recently been, as evidenced by the torn-up moss and barked 

 stems of the undergrowth, the performance would begin. 

 Selecting a spot near this, as open as might be in front, 

 but yet offering good concealment, and having the gun at 

 the ready and at full cock, the bleat would sound through the 

 silence of the wood. Oftener than not nothing came. At 

 times, however, a stick would be heard to crack, followed by 

 a "bump, bump, bump," when the buck would come bounding 

 and capering and showing himself off with the most fantastic 

 springs, and then stop suddenly short to look for the charmer. 

 That was the fatal moment for him, for a steady hand and a 

 charge of No. 3 shot in an Ely wire cartridge could hardly fail 

 to lay him low. Poor sport indeed, and an ignoble way of 

 circumventing the quarry. Yet, withal, it had its charms — 

 the novelty, the absolutely motionless attitude the shooter was 

 kept in, the study of the wind before taking up position for the 

 bleat — which, when commenced, had to be continued in one 

 uniform tone ; not a falsetto note to begin with and a diapason 

 the next — all combined to make excitement. The shooter was 

 almost bound to avail himself of the first standstill the buck 

 made, for if he could not see the doe he would often frisk off 



