RABBIT 257 



hesitation, swimming fairly fast, but with some splashing 

 in the process. This I have known to my cost, it having 

 spoilt several drives in which I have been participating. 

 On one low marshland shooting where the ground is flat 

 as a billiard-table, and shelter wherewith to screen the 

 guns exceedingly difficult to find, the old hares would, 

 on these driving days, readily swim a fairly wide river, 

 also a drain or two, rather than face the guns once the 

 firing had commenced. 



With the sport of rabbit-shooting all sportsmen are 

 more or less familiar, for this animal is the most abundant 

 and widely distributed of all objects of the shooter's quest. 

 How often one hears the remark made in connection 

 with cartridges : " Oh ! anything will kill a rabbit." 

 Given fair law, however, there are few things the same 

 size, furred or feathered, take more killing than the rabbit. 

 Then, too, thorns and briars, rough grass and coarse 

 herbage often intercept or break the force of the shot- 

 pellets. Or, perhaps, the rabbit is running down a 

 furrow or between the turnip-rows, and the shot must 

 cut through part of the obstruction to hit him at all, 

 otherwise it will simply flick a little fur off his back. 



Few things more decisively stamp the gunner as a good 

 shot than the effective manner in which he kills his rabbits. 

 There are few prettier sights in the shooting-field than 

 of a man taking all rabbits as they come thick and fast, 

 not picking or choosing his shots, and killing cleanly and 

 well almost every rabbit that stirs within his range of 

 vision. High-class work of this sort cannot be accom- 

 plished with inferior ammunition ; everything powder, 

 shot, caps and wadding must be excellent in their way 

 or assuredly a faulty shot must now and again occur. 



How many men, fairly good shots, acting on the 



