GUNNING-PUNT. 373 



The method of shooting wildfowl which I have last 

 described is the best calculated for the amusement of a 

 gentleman, as he may go out between breakfast and 

 dinner; and, in frosty weather, perhaps kill his twenty 

 or thirty couple in a day, followed by his companions, 

 who may keep at a distance, to enjoy a sight of the 

 sport ; and afterwards join in the " cripple chase." 

 [vide plate]. 



So far superior is this diversion to what people are 

 aware of, that I have never yet met with a solitary 

 instance of one sportsman, who had seen it in perfection, 

 but what was quite elated ; and preferred even a sight 

 of it to the best day's game shooting in the kingdom. 

 It is therefore condemned as an occupation for rustics 

 only by those who know nothing whatever about it. 



Let those, who fancy punt-shooting such a dangerous 

 amusement, compare the accidents that happen in it, 

 with those in fox-hunting, battu shooting, or any other 

 sport, and see in which they most frequently occur : 

 though this pursuit is generally followed by poor men, 

 who have the worst, the others, by gentlemen, who are 

 provided with the best, of every thing. In Poole har- 

 bour, for instance, where the channels, at times, are far 

 more dangerous than in most other places, I should, 

 at a rough guess, say, there were, on an average, a 

 hundred canoes ; and yet, for these last eighteen years, 

 which is as long as I have known the place, I have 

 never heard of but one man being drowned, and he was 

 not only subject to fits, but had left the shore when in 

 liquor. 



I here allude to open punts, than which decked ones 

 are of course infinitely less exposed to danger. 



