BLACK-GAME SHOOTING. 201 



raise his flight, let what will intercept him. The 

 old cock birds, even at the beginning of the season, 

 are very difficult of access ; as, on being approached, 

 they keep running forward instead of remaining with 

 the pack. 



The best, or, at all events, one of the best day's 

 black-game shooting that was ever known, I believe, 

 in these parts, I had with my old friend and brother 

 sportsman, Mr. John Ponton of Uddens House, on 

 the 25th of last August*. We found, on this gen- 

 tleman's manor, eleven brace in one day, which was 

 considered, by the keepers, extraordinary success ; 

 and we killed eight brace without missing a shot. 

 But notwithstanding all our birds were as strong, 

 and as large, as the old ones, we never even saw an 

 old cock the whole day. 



The black-game here are briefly called "poults." 

 The fagging for them is the hardest labour of any 

 sport I know, because you have to work, in the 

 hottest weather, through stiff heath, which is so 

 much intercepted by fir plantations and bogs, as, for 

 the most part, to prevent your riding ; and, from the 

 very few shots that you are likely to get in a day, 

 you have not the same encouragement, as in the 



* Black-game shooting, as will be seen by the game laws here- 

 after inserted, does not begin in the New Forest, nor in Devon- 

 shire nor Somersetshire, till the 1 st of September. But every 

 where else the first day is the 20th of August. Not being in the 

 bounds of the New Forest, therefore, we began even five days after 

 the time ; consequently were not transgressing the law, as it might 

 appear, without this explanation. 



