20 BEITANNY AND THE CHASE. 



the people give them but little help, as their manner of 

 loading is bad. For instance, wadding is rarely used, 

 but, instead, great pieces of paper as large as your hand. 

 You may trace a sportsman by these relics; and news- 

 papers, being cheap and much read, are the usual mate- 

 rials. You may guess the character of your predecessor 

 by his wadding. If it be the " Constitutionnel " or the 

 " Siecle," you have a sporting bourgeois before you ; if 

 the " Presse " or the " Charivari," a philosophe or a sprig 

 of nobility ; if the " Republicain " or the " Proscrit," a 

 rouge Socialist, o{ ^Y\\om. prenez garde. When a Frenchman 

 kills at twenty-five yards, he thinks it a long shot. Once 

 I dropped a bird at a rather long distance; my friend 

 was in ecstasies : " Eighty yards," said he, " if it was an 

 inch ; never saw such a shot," &c. ; but on stepping it I 

 found it just forty-five yards. I afterwards heard him 

 telling another person, " Oh, sacrV, such a shot ! cent 

 metres et plus ! " In truth, you may wipe their eye, as it 

 is called, as often as you like. 



A good English gun is much prized; but few will 

 give the price for it, as French guns seldom exceed 7Z. 

 or Si. This is just as well, as you look in vain for a 

 well-kept gun. Cleaning is very rarely performed, and 

 it is wonderful so ^qw burst. I once shot with a man 

 whose gun had a hole, a positive hole, in the barrel; it 

 was about as large as a pin's head, and a foot from the 

 muzzle. I took good care to give him a wide berth, but 

 he blazed away without a second thought about it. Another 

 time, in firing at a covey with a Frenchman, whiz went 

 something past my ear. " Hallo ! don't shoot meJ^ 



