CANOE SHOOTING. 325 



On arriving sufficiently near, should the water be so 

 low that you cannot present your gun at the birds with- 

 out kneeling or standing up, you must get aground at 

 the side of the creek, or steady your canoe by means of 

 forcing each oar from "between the ihowls into the mud, 

 otherwise the recoil of the gun will set her rocking, 

 and thus you might possibly be tipped out. Having 

 made all fast, rise up and fire. Take care, however, to 

 rise high enough to be WELL CLEAR OF THE MUD, or 

 NOT A FEATHER WILL YOU TOUCH ; and present as 

 follows : By day, or moonlight, if the birds are close, 

 directly at them : or if beyond forty yards, shoot at 

 their heads ; unless they are feeding in a concave place, 

 where the tide has left a kind of plash, in which case 

 you must level rather under them, or you will only graze 

 their back feathers. In starlight take your aim just 

 on the top of the NARROW BLACK LINE, IN WHICH 



BIRDS ALWAYS APPEAR, TO ONE WHO IS LOW 



DOWN ; and when so dark that you cannot see your 

 gun, present, as you think, about a foot over, or you 

 will most likely shoot about a foot under them. 



Should you have been successful, you will, if at night, 

 generally hear your cripples beating on the mud, before 



paste of cowdung and chopped straw , but, before this will ignite 

 properly, it must be baked in an oven for about thrice as long as the 

 time required for making bread. 



All these things may answer very well behind the screen of a decoy; 

 but in a canoe, or punt, the fire could not be so easily concealed, and 

 there would be some danger in lighting it where one, without a re- 

 treat, was sitting on straw, and with gunpowder on board. The 

 burnt turf, &c. may be used with success by a person walking behind 

 the high banks of a pond, or river, who may light it, when required, 

 by carrying on a match a little hy per oxy muriate of potash, and 

 dipping it into a small phial of vitriolic acid. 



