316 A YEAR OF SPORT AND NATURAL HISTORY. 



slatey grey reflected from the lowering skies, then the 'long- 

 shore shooter knows that in his solitary walks between sea 

 and land he will meet with bigger and better fowl. 



No inland region has half the variety of bird-life to offer to the 

 sportsman that he finds on the strip of sand and salting, often 

 not two hundred yards in width, which lies between low-water 

 mark and the first tussocks of turf that grow where sea-sand 

 or shingle stones meet the alluvial inland soil. 



The shooting itself is partly in the nature of stalking, partly 

 in that of flight shooting ; partly the birds rise to the gun like 

 snipe in a marsh, or partridges in a clover-field. There are 

 constant surprises, too, in shore shooting, and the bird that 

 the shooter leasts expects to see often rises at his feet. When he 

 has used his field-glass, perhaps in vain, to find a flock of 

 curlew or whimbrel on the miles of smooth sand, a belated knot or 

 godwit will rise from the rocks between the shooter and the sea 

 and give him an easy cross shot at forty yards ; or a brace 

 of teal will start at his feet from a rushy, fresh-water drain as 

 he crosses it, and afford the prettiest of double shots. Then 

 again the path through the air for all the shore-birds is along the 

 narrow strip between land and sea afore mentioned, and the 

 'long-shore shooter comes in for the benefit of such fowl as 

 are ill-advised enough to fly within forty or fifty yards of his 

 head. 



The chief expectation of the shore gunner is to stalk and 

 kill such of the larger waders as he can descry with his field-glass 

 on the wet sands between high and low water-marks. Of these 

 the most sought for is perhaps the curlew the great, grey, 

 long-legged woodcock of the barren moorland and barren sea 



