138 IN THE LAND OF THE BORA. 



expert loader with one would have been ready 

 much sooner than he ever was. His average of 

 miss- fires was about two in every three shots, 

 but when it did go off he made very creditable 

 shooting with it. 



We left Gradina at about eight, and paddled 

 right across the marshes to a hamlet on the high- 

 road which leads from Metkovic to Neum, in 

 Turkey. The marshes were alive with waders 

 that morning, and we had not gone far before 

 Jusic shoved the canoe ashore and begged me 

 to " shoot the snipe." Now, I never can see a 

 snipe on the ground, so, after some fruitless 

 attempts on his part to point it out, the long 

 barrel was pushed over my shoulder, and scolopax 

 lay kicking in the mud. At the shot dozens of 

 others flew off, but I had no small-shot cartridges 

 with me. Presently he tried to point out another 

 not three yards off, but again unsuccessfully, 

 and the bird was off before he could shoot. 

 There were literally any quantity about just there, 

 and also plover, of which last I annexed three 

 out of divers flocks that swept over us. I think 

 it must have taken us two hours to paddle across, 

 and then we took to the hills. As we had neither 

 of us any exact idea of where the birds were 

 likely to be, we beat up two sides of a steep 

 glen, and before long I heard their familiar call, 

 a sort of choking whistle. The Morlak had got 



