112 SHOOTING THE PARTRIDGE 



of the first-rate sportsman and naturalist no less than 

 of the first-rate shot. Here is a simple instance : A 

 whole posse of keepers, beaters and loaders of the 

 ordinary sort may agree that a bird dropped just over 

 a fence. The first-rate shot (I can find no better 

 term to describe him) alone expresses doubt. The 

 bird, no doubt, got over the fence at the point unani- 

 mously agreed on, but he alone doubts his having 

 dropped at once. On seeking for this bird much 

 time is wasted in following the verdict of the majority, 

 and it is eventually found to have crossed the whole 

 of the next field before dropping under the next fence 

 beyond. This is not experience, for the keepers, and 

 probably some of the beaters, have plenty of that in 

 such matters. It is simply that the accurate mind 

 of our first-rate friend, though he expected the bird 

 to drop after topping the fence, was not satisfied, 

 although it lowered its level of flight again, that it did 

 so ' in articulo mortis.' 



I have perhaps wandered from the question of 

 style to that of the attributes which produce it 

 naturally ; but a great deal of style in shooting is 

 acquired. The feet must be firm on the ground, the 

 body not bent forward, as shown in so many inferior 

 pictorial representations, but 'trunk erect,' as Kentfield 

 has it in his book on billiards. What you will find 



