210 LARK OXBIRD. 



Notwithstanding these two are seldom regarded by 

 sportsmen, yet there is scarcely a greater delicacy than 

 either the one or the other. 



In shooting all kinds of rails press them very hard, 

 or you will have difficulty to get them on wing. If 

 they are in a hedge, go a-head of your dogs, and shake 

 it before them. Having once driven them up, you 

 should fire, if there is any chance, as the difficulty of 

 springing them a second time is tenfold. 



LARK. Alauda arvensisL'alouette. 



To shoot larks (or any other small birds) in hard 

 weather, sweep away the snow, and sprinkle a long train 

 of scearl*, corn, or chaff, within shot of some hedge or 

 place that you can walk to unseen, and occasionally 

 give them a sweeping. 



OXBIRD, PURRE, or STINT. Tringa cinclus 

 L'alouette de mer. 



To get a shot among the clouds of oxbirds, which 

 frequent the shores, go in your canoe, and either take 

 them on the mud from a creek at low water, or on a 

 gravelly point at high water. A white frost is the best 

 time for this, and they are then most commonly inter- 

 spersed with gray plover. 



Oxbirds are sometimes so tame in windy weather, 

 about the month of August, that, at high water, you 

 may walk along the beach, and shoot them openly with 

 a little double gun. Perhaps, after killing a dozen with 

 your first barrel, the remainder of the flock will pitch 



* A provincial term for those light seeds, that fall through the 

 rudder, when cleaning the wheat, and of which the small birds are 

 particularly fond. 



