134 KRIDER'S SPORTING ANECDOTES. 



picked up this bird, was an old friend of the 

 editor's, and we are inclined to place implicit 

 faith in his report. Dennis Welsh before no- 

 ticed, also remembers two or three cases of the 

 same nature in the course of thirty years' expe- 

 rience in rail shooting. In one instance, the first 

 bird which he flushed on the tide, fell dead at 

 the simple report of the cap, the gun missing fire, 

 which incident so affected the shooter, that,- after 

 examining the bird, he directed Dennis to put 

 back for the ferry, declaring that he would shoot 

 no more. There was a high tide rising on the 

 marshes, and Welsh, who always enters deeply 

 into the sport, ventured to expostulate; the gen- 

 tleman, however, was firm in his determination 

 never to kill another rail, and after deliberately 

 destroying his box with a large stone, called for 

 his carriage and departed. 



" From what I could hear," said the pusher, 

 "I believe he has never been out since." An- 

 other sage old pusher and duck paddler, who 

 had also seen rail "play the 'possum," or kick 

 the bucket outright in this mysterious way, 

 gravely advanced the opinion, that although 

 these birds had not been touched by the charges 

 aimed at their bodies, they had nevertheless 

 died, indirectly, from the effects of lead in the 



