THE FIELD. SNIPE-SHOOTING. 253 



and that, instead of jumping up breast high at one jerk, 

 and then zigzagging away like a flash of lightning, they 

 will flop lazily along, like half-awakened owls in daylight, 

 and, if they have been undisturbed and have long haunted 

 the ground, will often drop again within twenty yards of 

 the dog that has flushed them. 



When they do thus, there is no easier bird, even for 

 a tyro ; all that has to be done is to let them go away a 

 fair distance, so as to allow for the spread of your shot, 

 to be cool, and to cover your bird before you pull the 

 trigger. 



There is one peculiarity in the snipe, that it invari- 

 ably rises up wind, and goes away as nearly up wind as 

 possible. The consequence is that a mode of beating for 

 him is proper, is indeed the only proper mode, which 

 would be decidedly wrong in trying for any other kind 

 of game. 



One must invariably beat down wind for him. If 

 possible, and where there is a long narrow range of 

 meadow, I would make a great circuit, and lose a couple of 

 hours in doing so, since it is by far the better way to enter 

 the ground from the windward, instead of, as one should do 

 in every other sort of shooting, from the leeward end. If 

 not, the whole tract must be worked diagonally, never 

 fully up- wind, and wherever an unusually likely piece of 

 lying ground, soft oozy tender grass, outspread in patches 

 between high dry reed beds or burnt grounds, in which 

 snipe never lie, or rusty half evaporated slanks and pools, 

 or tussocky spring bogs, a circuit must be made to get the 

 wind. If the dog points, the shooter must in every case 



