100 WARWICK WOODLANDS. 



" Practice, however, soon brings this all to rights. The first 

 season I shot here I was a very fair, indeed a good, young 

 shot, when I came out hither not at all crack, but decidedly 

 better than the common run ! the first day I shot was on 4th 

 of July, 1832, the place Seer's swamp, the open end of it; the 

 witness old Tom Draw and there I missed, in what we now 

 call open covert, fourteen birds running ; and left the place in 

 despair I could not, though I missed at home by shooting too 

 quick I could not, for the life of me, shoot quick enough. 

 Even you, Frank, shoot three times as well as you did, when 

 you began here ; yet you began in autumn, which is decidedly 

 a great advantage, and came on by degrees, so that the follow- 

 ing summer you were not so much nonplussed, though I re- 

 member the first day or two, you bitched it badly." 



" Well, I believe I must knock under, Harry," Forester an- 

 swered ; " and here comes Timothy with the coffee, and so we 

 will to bed, that taken, though I do want to argufy with you, 

 on some of your other notions about dogs, scent, and so forth. 

 But do you think the Commodore will join us here to-morrow ?" 



" No 1 I don't think so," Harry said, " I know it ! Did not 

 he arrive in New York last first of July, from a yachting tour at 

 four o'clock in the afternoon ; receive my note saying that I 

 was off to Tom's that morning ; and start by the Highlander at 

 five that evening ? Did he not get a team at Whited's and 

 travel all night through, and find me just sitting down to break- 

 fast, and change his toggery, and out, and walk all day like a 

 trump as he is ? And did not we, by the same token, bag 

 besides twenty-five more killed that we could not find one 

 hundred and fifteen cock between ten o'clock and sunset ; while 

 you, you false deceiver, were kicking up your heels in Buffalo ? 

 Is not all this a true bill, and have you now the impudence to 

 ask me whether / think the Commodore will come ? I only 

 wish I was as sure of a day's sport to-morrow, as I am of his 

 being to the fore at luncheon time !" 



" At luncheon time, hey ? I did not know that you looked 

 for him so early ! Will he be in time, then, for the afternoon's 

 shooting ?" 



" Why, certainly he will," returned Archer. " The wind has 

 been fair up the river all day long, though it has been but light ; 

 and the lanthe will run up before it like a race-horse. I should 

 not be much surprised if he were here to breakfast." 



