GUN STORIES 265 



Time was when wild-fowl shooting was a lucrative 

 occupation along the southern and eastern coasts of 

 England, and was a steady source of income to the pro- 

 fessional shooter. I have heard of one professional punter 

 — that is, a shooter from a punt — not what the term implies 

 in racing or rowing circles — who cleared ;^ioo in a season, 

 selling the wild-fowl he shot at an average price of two 

 shillings per brace, so that he must have shot something 

 like 3000 head in five months. But the ubiquitous amateur 

 gunner who goes popping and blazing everywhere with no 

 other result than frightening the birds, and the encroach- 

 ments of civilisation, have rendered the birds so shy and 

 scarce that the poor professional wild-fowler finds his 

 occupation gone. I suppose he would consider himself in 

 most cases lucky now if he cleared ;^20 in a season. 



Colonel Hawker, to whom I have already referred, was a 

 sportsman, and not a mere slaughterer of game. He kept 

 a diary of every day's shooting during the fifty seasons of 

 his career. His sum total for the whole period was 17,753 

 head of all kinds — including 7035 partridges, 575 pheasants, 

 2ii6snipe, 4488 swans, ducks, and geese, 1831 river-side and 

 seashore birds, and the rest various. He was content with 

 small bags, and found his own game in places where it was 

 by no means plentiful. How deadly a shot he was may be 

 gathered from the fact that he frequently killed 14 or 15 

 snipe in succession without a miss, and seldom failed to 

 account for 18 out of every 20 partridges he fired at. 

 There are not many sportsmen nowadays who can 

 compare with him either in moderation or skill — indeed, 

 notwithstanding the increased superiority of modern 

 fowling-pieces, I do not see that the shooting of to-day is 

 superior to that of old. I don't think I could point out 

 any gunner whom it would be safe to back to beat Captain 

 Horatio Ross, who was as great with the gun as with the 

 rifle. In the month of July 1828, Captain Ross was on his 

 way back from the Red House, Battersea — where the Duke 

 of Wellington and the Earl of Winchelsea fought their 

 duel — in company with General Anson and Lord de Ros, 

 and Lord de Ros remarked, " No one has a chance with 

 Captain Ross at pigeons, but I wonder if he would be as 



