178 SHOOTING THE PARTRIDGE 



and whose opportunities are neither so great nor so 

 frequent. Many pleasant days have I had with men 

 of the B. stamp and much of the groundwork of 

 partridge-shooting did I learn from them. Now, in 

 return I must, while thanking them for what they 

 taught me, urge upon them that most of the improve- 

 ments in the art of managing partridges on closely 

 preserved estates include lessons which they, on 

 smaller properties, and with less expense, can learn to 

 follow on a smaller scale. The half-moon principle, 

 for instance, can and should be carried out in minia- 

 ture by a party of, say, four or five persons, all told. 

 In approaching birds under these conditions, and on 

 ground where the boundary must be made a constant 

 study, it is of vital importance that somebody should 

 be between the birds and the dangerous quarter before 

 they rise. When your party consists of, say, two guns 

 and three beaters or keepers, I can conceive very few 

 circumstances under which you should move in a 

 straight line. One must be prepared to run while 

 the other stands still ; one to be forward while the 

 other keeps back. It is a game of working well 

 together, and though probably one will always be 

 the host and manager and the other the guest or 

 subordinate in theory, they must in practice consider 

 eacli other equally, and give way as circumstanres arise. 



