SHOOTING OF SMALL BIRDS. 157 



This bird is so ^yell laiown, that any description of it is superflu- 

 ous. It builds its nest upon the ground, where it is exposed to 

 the depredations of many of the smaller ammals of prey, as the 

 weasel and the stoat. Mr. Mudie says : " The lark selects her 

 ground with care, avoiding clayey places, unless she can find two 

 clods so placed as that no part of a nest between them would be 

 below the surface. In more friable soils she scrapes till she has not 

 only formed a little cavity, but loosened the bottom of it to some 

 depth. Over this the first layers are placed very loosely, so that if 

 any rain should get in at the top, it may sink to the bottom, and 

 there be absorbed by the soil. The edges of the nest are als9 raised 

 a little above the surface, have a slope outwards, and are, as it were, 

 thatched. The position in Avhich 1«.e bird sits is a fm-ther security, 

 and as the head is always turned to the weather, the feathers_ ot 

 the breast and throat completely prevent the ram from eiitermg 

 the nest at the side, while the \vings and tail act as pent-houses 

 in the other parts, and, if the weather be violent, and the ram 

 fall at a small angle with the horizon, the forepart of the bird, upon 

 which the plumage is thickest, receives the whole of it." 



What is called the tioirling for larks, is a mode ot amusement 

 followed in France, and is thus described:— 



These birds are draAvn to any given spot m considerable num- 

 bers, by a singular contrivance called a mirror. This is a small 

 machine, made of a piece of mahogany, shaped like a chapeau bras, 

 and higlily pohshed, or else it is made up of common wood, in- 

 laid with small bits of looking glass, so as to reflect the sun s 

 rays upwards. It is fixed on the top of a thm iron-rod, on an 

 upright spindle, dropped through an iron hoop or ring, attached 

 to a piece of wood to drive into the ground. By puUing a strm.g 

 fastened to the spindle, the mirror twirls round, and the reflected 

 light unaccountably attracts the larks, who hover over i1^ and be- 

 come a mark for the shooting sportsman. There is 9tten what 

 the French call capital sport in this way. Sometimes six dozen ot 

 these birds are shot before breakfast : sometimes the sportsman 

 sits on the ground, and pulls the twirler himself, and sometimes a 

 boy or servant is employed to do it. Ladies often partake ot the 

 amusement on a cold dry morning, not by shootmg, but bv watch- 

 ing the sport. Occasionally there are ten or a dozen parties out 

 together, firing at a distance of five or six hundred yards and by 

 this device the larks are kept constantly on the wmg I he most 

 favourable mornings are, when there is a gentle light frost Avit i 

 Httle or no wind, and the sky clear. Wlien cloudy the birds Avdl 

 not appear To a bystander it Avould almost suggest the tliouglit, 

 that the larks themselves enjoyed their own destruction for the 

 fascination of the twirler is so strong as to rob them of the usual 

 fruits of experience. After being fired at several times, they re- 

 turn to the twirler, and form again into groups above it ; some 

 of them even flying down, and sitting upon the ground, withm 

 a yard or two of the astonishing instrument, looking at it this 



