106 SHOOTING THE PARTRIDGE 



fare to shute whar the' hev' bin.' And you will surely 

 shoot where they have been if you aim at them. 



One thing that makes partridges very difficult is 

 that they never, or hardly ever, come at you or go away 

 from you in a straight line. The line is almost always 

 a curve, and sometimes a very sharp one. When you 

 add to this the variations of pace and light, and the 

 necessity for shooting over, it becomes obvious that 

 the calculation is too complicated to be made at the 

 moment of firing, and must therefore be instinctive. 

 But I am convinced that men who are beginning to 

 shoot can improve themselves greatly by following the 

 principle of calculation, that is, by treating the bird 

 as an object that has to be, so to speak, cut off or 

 intercepted at a certain spot, and not as an object to 

 be aimed at. 



The first-rate man will astonish you much by the 

 amazing long shots he will kill, aye, and kill stone 

 dead, and that very often. Forty yards (usually 

 described as fifty or even sixty) is a long shot, 

 but when your gun makes a good plate at forty yards 

 there is very little chance in favour of the bird. 

 Our friend acquires this, one of the most beautiful 

 things to see in good shooting, by his invariable 

 practice of allowing a good distance in front of the 

 bird. It is the same system at long shots as that 



