FEATS OF MASTER HABEY. 07 



at length saved money sufficient to buy a real fishing- 

 rod, line, reel and all, quite complete. Down it came 

 from London resplendent with varnish, and many 

 cunning feats did I perform with it. About this time 

 I learned to shoot ; not that I was strong enough to 

 hold a gun, but that the keeper put the said implement 

 to his shoulder, when I took aim at larks and sparrows, 

 and those sort of things, and pulled the trigger. So I 

 waxed in years and wisdom. All the time I could 

 steal from my lessons (for I was not quite a Pawnee) 

 I spent in this edifying manner ; at length I was fully 

 initiated in all the mysteries of sporting by a relation, 

 himself the prince of sportsmen, who took a fancy to 

 me. The reason was as follows : — 



In the depth of winter, the ground being smothered 

 with snow, and the blast bitter, I followed him out a 

 wild-fowl shooting. I was devoid of hat, an article that 

 I looked upon as superfluous, and that I always lost or 

 mislaid as soon as it was given me. Equipped I was in 

 white cotton stockings ; and my shoes, which were of 

 the thinnest, I had tied to my feet with a string which 

 passed over the instep. I could not put them up at 

 heel with any comfort, because I had large chilblains 

 there, which were broke. At length, after creeping a 

 space on my gloveless hands and knees in the snow, and 

 under cover of some sedge and willow bushes, up flew 

 some wild ducks before my patron. " Quack, quack !" 

 — down came one to his shot, and fell with a splash 

 into the river. In I plunged after him like a New- 

 foundland dog : you might have heard the flounce in 

 a still day at Chippenham, about six miles off. The 



