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CHAPTER II 9 



'TOUJOURS PERDRIX' FORM GOOD AND BAD 



How well each one of us remembers his first par- 

 tridge ! I well remember mine. It was not the bird 

 I aimed at ; I had been out many days without strik- 

 ing a single bird with even an outside shot. I am 

 afraid I at last got to shoot vaguely at the covey like 

 Mr. Tupman though not like him with my eyes 

 shut ; and when this bird was finally retrieved he 

 was a strong runner I felt more of shame than of 

 pride. I learnt under old Hirst, the keeper at 

 Hawarden Castle, my first season, in the days of the 

 kindly and accomplished Sir Stephen Glynne, and, 

 therefore, before his brother-in-law, the great Mr. 

 Gladstone, succeeded to the property. Very kind to 

 me they both were, and whatever great questions of 

 State may have possessed Mr. Gladstone's time and 

 brain at this period, for I confess I do not remember, 

 he always had a genial word or two, and an enquiry 

 how the sport fared when I came in at night. Old Hirst 



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