B4 LIFE AND SPOUT IN HAMPSHIRE 



a powerful flier, the partridge. Once started, they 

 seem to drive clean and straight as a ruled line 

 through the water and the air; and, if we knew or 

 guessed nothing of the working of this machinery, 

 the last thing we should suspect would be that this 

 hard driving course in a straight line was achieved 

 by a perpetual series of curves, an alternation of 

 concave and convex, each beautifully rounded, and 

 the hollow of one accurately corresponding with 

 the hill of the other. Yet that is what occurs in 

 the swift movement of the trout or the partridge. 

 The impetus and the straightness so clear to the 

 eye are only secured by then: figure - of - eight or 

 "waved track" action, regular as the strokes of the 

 piston in the trout by the body and tail, in the 

 partridge by the wings an action for the most part 

 quite hidden from our view. 



Perhaps in the trout this action is less obscure 

 than in the partridge, for if we are behind the 

 trout, at any rate, when it first starts, we may see 

 that tail and part of body the bending part 

 are set to describe through the water an undulating 

 track of concave and convex. At most, however, 

 we are shown a sinuous line of snake-smooth curves. 

 We cannot see that figure which Pettigrew taught 

 us, I believe taught us rightly, to accept alike in 

 the fish and the bird. In the partridge, whether 

 at the start, the full flight, or the finish, we can 

 see nothing of this action by curves. We only 



