364 THE FOWLER IN IRELAND. 



and taint the birds. When you have a number 

 of fowl in your punt, and no following boat at hand 

 to take them, do not pitch them anyhow fore and 

 aft, but lay them in a row on your right and left 

 under the side-decks, wash and clean them as soon 

 as convenient after being shot, before the mud 

 hardens. Fowl picked up off the ooze can, of 

 course, never be made to look well-dressed as those 

 shot and retrieved on water ; but at all times it is 

 pleasant to see a fowler at the day's end produce 

 the result of his shooting clean and sweet, instead 

 of in a blood and mud-stained heap. 



Positions of danger and difficulty vary greatly. 

 Yet many hints may be learnt from others, and 

 more from experience. If caught in rough weather 

 away from shore or following boat, keep broadside 

 or nearly so to the sea. Never put a punt on 

 such occasions stem on to the waves, rather drift 

 two or three miles out of your course to a strange 

 shore, or till help is at hand, than run a risk of 

 being swamped. The fore-deck of a punt is so 

 long and pointed, and to a certain extent flat, that 

 the power of throwing off, or rising from, a wave 

 is small, as the bow runs too sharp to have much 

 buoyancy for a quick rise from under water. When 

 in this position, and another sea takes her ere 

 recovering, there is great danger of filling or be- 

 coming water-logged, especially if the gun be in 

 its usual place and has not been run inboard.* 



* By waves I do not, of course, mean such as would cause a whale- 

 boat to stand on end ; as bad a sea as that a fowler should never 

 be overtaken by if he possesses common sight and observation. 

 Should he be, Lord help him ! but even then let him keep his wits, 

 and consider well before acting. A punt by itself and without the 



