DAYS STOLEN FOR SPORT 93 



'forarder' and ripe to down the duck, no matter the 

 distance or direction. 



The farmers were having a grand time; the duck 

 were plentiful and strangely tame, and every bird that 

 rose called forth a volley from hidden marksmen, some 

 of whom fired late as if in gleesome response to the 

 resounding cracks of their neighbours' guns. Drippings 

 from the trees above had long since ceased, so there 

 could be no mistake that what was dropping from 

 them were shots that had come across the water, and 

 one of these planted in an eye would be very painful. 



The disappointing way in which the birds fiew 

 annoyed me until I was quite put out and asked for 

 explanation. 



'Tell me, keeper, why don't your duck mount 

 and clear off instead of making flights a moorhen 

 would be ashamed of ? ' 



'Well, sir, you see, thay are a pinion short; we 

 cuts the first joint from one of their wings when they 

 are 3'oung.' 



The matter thus explained, I had to move. Keen 

 as I am at most kinds of sport, I sicken in a moment 

 at others. What more glorious than a frosty morn- 

 ing's tramp round iiishy swamps where at any moment 

 the dogs may give you a chance at duck; and how 

 happy one can be during a long forenoon, without 

 having had a shot, though as keen as Nature intended 

 us to be to put something in the larder ! But how 

 can there be pleasure in a sport where the animal 

 has no chance? 



We started to try the smaller water, and, while 

 going there, the subject of conversation was guns 

 and accidents. Guns were evidently a terror to the 

 doctor, and I, having witnessed an accident with 

 a gun, have my respect for that instrument most 

 fully developed : when it is in safe hands I don't 

 think of it, but when in a youngster's hands and held 

 in my direction I squirm. The doctor rather liked 



