ORIGINAL INTRODUCTION. 



"Nay, if you come to that, Sir, have not the wisest of men in all ages, not 

 excepting Solomon himself, have they not had their HOBBY HOUSES : their run- 

 ning horses, their coins and their cockle-shells, their drums and their trumpets 

 their fiddles and their pallets, their maggots and their butterflies ? And so long 

 .as a man rides his HOBBY HORSE peaceably and quietly along the King's Highway, 

 and neither compels you nor me to get up behind him, pray, eir, what have 

 either you or I to do with it?" 



Tristram Shandy. 



The following- sketches were originally published in the 

 " Shooting- Times " and the " Preston Herald." As information 

 about localities for seafowl shooting- is eagerly sought by many 

 ardent gunners, resident inland, who, like myself, cannot afford 

 regular shooting, and, in addition, prefer the increased excite- 

 ment and adventure experienced in the pursuit of wildfowl, the 

 sketches are now issued in book form. 



What an attraction there is in the " unchangeable " sea, as 

 Byron so beautifully calls it ! What an exhilarating sense of 

 freedom there is in walking along the shore, gun in hand, in 

 the early morning when nature is still half asleep ; then, if alone, 

 is the time for contemplation. Many a difficult problem may be 

 thought out. If with a chosen friend, what delightful confidences 

 may be exchanged ! 



I conceive that shooting is the most natural hobby a person can 

 have. Few men care to take a " constitutional " for its own 

 sake ; but set an object before a man, and the most indifferent 

 will, as a rule, energetically strive to attain it. 



Personally, I have followed shooting under many difficulties, 

 and I shall be glad if my experiences smooth the way a little 

 for other brethren of the craft. Both theoretically and practically 

 I have for over twenty years been an ardent student of the " art 

 of fowling." 



