WOODCOCK SHOOTING. 91 



in Wales is an ugly raw-boned, cross-made derivation from the 

 light-setter, degraded through half-a-dozen generations of bastardy; 

 than which, with a view of being made into pointers, it is not 

 possible to conceive more nnpromisiag materials ; and upon which, 

 therefore, if such be the effects producible, it is fair to conclude 

 what a similar disciphne is capable of doing with superior natures. 

 By hunger and hard work, both of which they get plenty, they 

 are brought down to obedience ; and their draw upon a cock in-a 

 wood, under the dread of their master's aim, with the power of 

 which they soon become acquainted, is wrought into a full stop." 



A few years back, there was a regular system of shooting and 

 entrapping the woodcock pursued in Scotland, for the Edinburgh 

 and Glasgow markets. In some localities, in this part of Britain, 

 the bird is very common, and there is a varied abundance of food 

 for their su;pport, particularly in the western side of the island, 

 "srhere the winter season is comparatively mild and open, and the 

 springs and boggy grounds are free from frost. In a letter written 

 somewhere about 1826, Sir Walter Scott wrote to a friend in the 

 following strain, " I have been out for two or three days endeavour- 

 mgto obtaha a shot or two at a woodcock, but I have not been 

 successful ; the fact is, these birds are now taken off wholesale by 

 a band of men who do nothing else for the season but kill them, 

 and they find a ready and profitable market for them in all our 

 large and populous Scottish cities and towns. I was lately informed 

 by one poulterer of Edinburgh, that he had paid one man nearly 

 one hundred pounds last season for woodcocks, which he had 

 chiefly shot in the western parts of Argyleshire and Invernesshire. 

 This seems prodigious." It is likewise stated in the work from 

 flrhich this letter is taken {Annals of Sporting, Mitibm-gh, 1839), 

 liiat formal appKcations had been made to the magistracy of 

 several districts in Scotland, to endeavour to put a stop to this 

 wholesale destruction and traffic. 



It would appear, that poaching for woodcocks must have attained 

 . high state of repute formerly, from the zeal and contrivances dis- 

 mayed to capture these birds. Gervase Markham, more than two 

 senturies ago, describes a stalking horse which was used for this 

 purpose. He says, " When a man" (we modernize the orthography), 

 '* intends to compass a shooting among fowls, he must have some 

 moving shadow or shelter to walk by him ; in this case there is 

 aothing better than the stalking horse, which is an old jade trained 

 ap for that use, which being stripped naked, and having nothing 

 but a string about the nether chap, of two or three yards long, will 

 gently, and as you have occasion to urge him, walk up and down 

 in the water which way you will have him, feeding and eatpag 

 upon the grass, and other stuff that grows therein ; and then being 

 hardy and stout, without taking any affright at the report of the 

 piece beMnd his forequarter, bending your body down low by his 

 dde, and keeping his body still full between you and the fowl. 

 Then having (as before showed) chosen your mark, you shall take 



