148 EEMINISCENCES OF A SPORTSMAN. 



time was three francs, or half-a-crown ; but I have little 

 doubt, like everything else, the price is considerably in- 

 creased. Great havoc was made in Cornwall and Devon- 

 shire by glade nets hung in the woods, in former times, 

 when the Exeter coach brought thirty dozen in a week 

 up to the London market. 



The late Lord M. had an estate in Devonshire on 

 which there was an extensive wood. Every winter, 

 about forty years ago, his lordship's gamekeeper used 

 to send him to his residence in Oxfordshire such 

 an abundance of woodcocks shot in this wood and other 

 covers that they were frequently made into pies, 

 which is an excellent dish. This ample supply has 

 now ceased for several years. At a battue, a few 

 years ago. Lord Hastings, who resides in Norfolk, near 

 the eastern coast, shot with his party forty-two couples 

 of woodcocks. This, I conclude, was a flight that had 

 just arrived in this country, and were probably resting 

 themselves in his lordship's woods for a few days, after 

 a stormy passage across the sea, previous to their dis- 

 persing themselves over the interior of the country. 



The greatest slaughter of woodcocks that I ever heard 

 of took place in the winter of 1856 by the Lord High 

 Commissioner of the Ionian Islands with a party (I am 

 ignorant of the number of guns) in Albania. They 

 shot three hundred and eighty-five in eight days. 



The cock shooting in the west of Scotland* is in some 



* On tlie 8th November 1858, his Grace the Duke of Hamilton and 

 J. V. Fairlie, Esq. went out shooting in the Isle of Ai-ran, and in foiir 

 hours killed 33 woodcocks, besides grouse, black game, hares, &e. The 

 shooting of the duke and Mr. Fairlie was very much admired, as 

 scarcely a bird escaped that was shot at, and IMi-. Faii-lie had three 

 right and lefts, which seldom happens in one day at woodcock season. 

 The Field. 



