136 A MEDLEY OF SPORT 



my ears, and looldng in the direction whence the shooting 

 proceeded, I saw a small bunch of ringed plover heading 

 towards me. Unfortunately a yell from one of the 

 beaters caused the birds to turn off sharply to the right 

 while yet a good 80 yards away from me. Muttering a 

 " blessing " upon the head of the Kaffir who spoiled my 

 chance at the birds, I again started forward, while de 



V , with a broad grin overspreading his freckled 



countenance, held up a couple of plover for my edifica- 

 tion. I very soon had my revenge, however, for a few 

 minutes later, when rounding a bend of the spruit, a 

 spring of between twenty and thirty pink-bill teal rose 

 in a " heap " within 12 yards of me. Aiming into the 

 thick of them, I pulled, and a leash dropped like so 

 many stones into the turbid water, while with my second 

 I stopped a fourth of the little duck, which, after carrying 

 on for a short distance across the veldt, pitched head 

 foremost into an antbear earth, to be gathered by my 

 bearer. Nothing further, with the exception of a small 



hare (Lepus capensis) shot by de V as he was walking 



through a patch of dry rushes, was got during the 

 remainder of the beat to the pan, and as we noticed 

 several paddlings of grey duck and pink-bill teal, together 

 with a big colony of coots resting on the water, we halted 

 to arrange a drive of the same. Having drummed into 

 the thick, woolly pates of our followers the manner in 

 which they were to drive to us when we had taken up our 

 stands in a belt of tall reeds growing at the farther end 

 of the lagoon, de V and myself made a detour over 



