SHORE SHOOTING FROM A BOAT. 17 



bag, and that was in a sailing boat drifting down before the gentlest of 

 zephyrs, without the slighest expectation of a shot. At two hundred yards 

 the ever wakeful fisher looked up, stretched a wing, and treated us to a long, 

 deliberate stare. We all took it for granted that he was off; but no; by some 

 unaccountable effort of avine reasoning he had persuaded himself that our 

 intentions were harmless, and, calmly turning his back, devoted himself once 

 more to the piscatorial art. Inch by inch we drifted on, until, seeing that 

 there was a chance after all, I borrowed the boatman's 8-bore a weapon 

 which I had always regarded with pious awe, but had never ventured to 



AT THE BAR. 



handle hitherto and shortly afterwards letting fly with much trepidation, I 

 was agreeably surprised to find my shoulder still intact, and the " Hanser " 

 lying doubled up upon the sand. That he would have let a mud-tramper come 

 within range is improbable in the extreme, and his capture affords one of many 

 instances of the subtle powers of self-insinuation possessed by a boat as 

 opposed to a walking man. 



Not that the boat can do much towards the acquisition of a specimen if 

 the man doesn't do his share properly when the moment arrives, as I was 

 made to realize very forcibly when pursuing two Great Crested Grebes in the 

 following year. Again the boat surpassed all expectations, and again, when 

 we least expected it, we saw that we were in for a shot. Though it was 



C 



