344 A MEDLEY OF SPOET 



Landing Gilson on the saltings, I poled up to T 



marsh, and, running the punt in a muddy little gut which 

 ran almost up to the sea-wall, I climbed over the embank- 

 ment, and made my way across a big lucerne marsh to a 

 wide sedge -fringed dyke, which I knew would lead me to the 

 fleet. I had not proceeded far when the " scape, scape " 

 of a snipe put me on the alert, and I caught a fleeting 

 glimpse of the long bill as he flashed across the moonbeams. 

 Snipe -shooting by the light of the moon is not my forte, 

 however, and Master Longbill got away without the loss 

 of a single feather. From time to time the cackle of 

 passing mallard, or the doleful calls of a bunch of peewits, 

 came to me, and the " trumpeting " of what must have 

 been a great herd of brent geese, travelling coastwards, 

 gladdened my ears ; but my eyes saw them not. 



At length the fleet lay before me, glistening under the 

 moonbeams ; a row of stunted and grotesquely-grown 

 willows fringing the right-hand shore of the water. So 

 wonderfully illuminated was the fleet that every object 

 floating upon its surface was easily discernible. But 

 beyond a few coots and moorhens, there were apparently 

 no fowl on the more open parts of the water. I therefore 

 decided to work the left-hand shore, there being more 

 reed-cover on that side. 



Brushing the tall, waving sedges with the barrels of my 

 gun as I walked, I expectantly waited for something 

 worthy powder and shot to get up. Beyond a couple of 

 " bald-heads " which got up behind me, and consequently 

 out of the moonlight — the moon was right ahead of me — 



