294 THE GUN: AFIELD AND AFLOAT 



fully-dug pit well down on the green-shore. To blaze 

 away into the brown, or rather the grey, of a flock of 

 Knot with the punt-gun is not first-class sport ; the better 

 plan perhaps is to put up a few wooden decoys, adding 

 to these a few of the dead birds made to stand erect and 

 life-like by means of pointed sticks. The shooter armed 

 with a double 12-bore will thus secure some most sport- 

 ing shots as the Knot wheel round or hover over his 

 decoys. 



Delightfully varied sport may now and again result 

 from a few hours spent in a pit. I fancy I can hear 

 some of my readers exclaim, on seeing mention made of 

 shooting from such place of concealment : "That must 

 be miserably cold and dirty work." But really it is not 

 necessarily so, for with proper drainage arrangements, a 

 small bundle of straw to sit upon, and another to spread 

 on the floor of the pit to prevent the mud and water 

 churning into slush by the action of the feet when the 

 shots are taken, few discomforts will be experienced by 

 the suitably-clad sportsman whilst shooting from a pit. 

 Properly equipped in wading-boots the discomforts 

 attendant upon pit-shooting are not greater than will be 

 encountered by the gunner whilst tramping the marsh, 

 and certainly not so great as those frequently endured 

 when one is laid in the bottom of a wet fowling-punt. 



In some situations I have found Curlew to be procur- 

 able only by means of a pit dug well out upon the salt- 

 marsh in their line of flight. After vainly trying to 

 circumvent these wary fowl by stalking or by setting to 

 them with the punt and big gun, it affords one infinite 

 satisfaction to find them coming up well within shot of 

 the pit. Under the circumstances a feeling of vengeance 

 against these extremely wide-awake fowl may perhaps 



