THE FIELD. SNIPE-SHOOTING. 249 



to wait patiently until the mood be passed or the weather 

 change, for unless something of the sort occur, sport under 

 the circumstances is hopeless. 



Perseverance, however, is always a merit, and is some- 

 times rewarded. I once remember, after wholly despair- 

 ing of sport, getting one of the best afternoon's shooting I 

 ever had, when the snipe, after playing about in the man- 

 ner above described for hours, until a hundred or two 

 were in the air at once in full sight, came in a great flight, 

 sixty or seventy yards high, directly overhead. I chanced 

 to have one barrel loaded with duck shot, and at once let 

 drive at them. Whether the shot struck their wings, or 

 whether, as I think more probable, they mistook the 

 whistling of the charge for the sound of a hawk's pin- 

 ions,* they instantly pitched, scattered over all the coun- 

 try, and lay so well that I made, eventually, a good bag. 



When one lives near the snipe grounds it is possible to 

 calculate, with some certainty, on the likelihood of sport, 

 from the nature of the ground, as described above, and 

 that of the weather, after birds are known to have arrived ; 

 in addition to which, their cry, as they fly to and fro from 

 feeding ground to feeding ground, or as they come in from 

 the south or north respectively in spring or autumn, on 

 misty, moonlight nights, gives proof of their scarcity or 

 abundance in the meadows. 



To persons, living in towns, and visiting the snipe 



* That birds frequently do so is certain. If a bullet be fired at a 

 heron, and pass any where near enough that he can hear it whistle, he 

 instantly throws himself on his back, with his bill pointed upward, 

 exactly as he does when preparing to repel the swoop of a falcon. 

 11* 



