i. RE.\fARxs ON MODERN GAME SHOOTING 1 1 



shooters standing behind rocks or in hollows, and 

 later on in properly constructed shelters. The grouse 

 at once began to increase in numbers, and are still 

 increasing, as, instead of the young or breeding birds 

 falling an easy prey to the shooter, these escape in a 

 much larger proportion than they did formerly, when 

 shooting over dogs was the general custom.* 



Though we are forced to out-manoeuvre the grouse 

 by 'driving,' as the only means of killing them in 

 places where the ground is flat and smooth and the 

 birds come to maturity early in the season, we 

 naturally frighten them into extreme wildness by 

 marching a line of men over the moors first in one 

 direction and then in another without cessation for 

 perhaps two or three days at a time. Yet we not 

 seldom hear the absurd question asked, ' Why are 

 grouse wilder now on an English moor than they 

 were in the days of our grandfathers ? ' One of the 



* As an instance of how grouse have multiplied under a systematic 

 destruction of vermin, and since ' driving ' came into vogue, it is 

 worth recording that the famous Bluberhouse Moor was let at the 

 beginning of the century by the writer's great-grandfather (Sir 

 Thomas Frankland, of Thirkleby) to h'is neighbour, the Lord Harewood 

 of that day, for ten brace of grouse a year ! Yet on this ground, con- 

 sisting of under 2,000 acres, Sir Thomas's descendant, Lord Walsing- 

 ham, has killed on one occasion 400 brace to his own gun in a day ; 

 and on another 500 brace to his own gun in a day. Now, Sir Thomas 

 (the author of ' Cautions to Young Sportsmen '), besides being a clever 

 inventor of sporting appliances, was considered the most noted shot 

 and one of the best sportsmen of his day ; and had Bluberhouse in 

 those times been capable of supplying him with sport for his gun, it 

 is most improbable he would have hesitated to enjoy thereon his 

 favourite recreation of shooting. 



