240 SHOOTING THE PARTRIDGE 



afford to leave all sordid or pecuniary considerations 

 on one side. The pleasures or profits arising from 

 this beautiful sport should be as much as possible 

 shared by those living on and around a game estate. 

 In whatever way you choose to do it, you should so 

 manage by tact, courtesy, and, above all, liberality, 

 that farmers, labourers, and neighbours must perceive 

 that their interests and yours are to a great extent 

 identical on the question of game. The better your 

 shooting the better for them should be the motto for 

 both 



It should surely not be a matter of great difficulty 

 to educate the farmers and labourers to this point of 

 view. Partridges are no enemies to the farmer. They 

 are largely insectivorous birds, and as they are a purely 

 indigenous race it is very certain that they have their 

 place in the balance of nature in these islands. Up 

 to the time when the corn is ripe they feed entirely 

 on insects and seeds of grasses, as well as of plants 

 which, from a farming point of view, are weeds. The 

 amount of grain which they eat, even where they exist 

 in large numbers, is insignificant, and as they do not 

 attack the corn in the ear, nor plunder the stukes, nor 

 injure the stems of crops, their share of the grain pro- 

 duced, entirely picked from the ground itself, would 

 in their absence be almost entirely wasted. 



