

CHAPTER XXIV. 

 LOST OPPORTUNITIES. 



" WHATEVER'S hit is history, and what is missed is mystery." This, I 

 believe, is a recognized axiom amongst bird collectors ; and I propose to 

 write a few words about some of those mysterious creatures which have 

 succeeded in baffling the efforts of my well-intentioned, but misdirected, 

 discharge. 



Fanciful as it may seem to many, there is a certain morbid pleasure 

 to be derived from speculating and theorizing on the subject of the birds 

 that .one has missed. There are people, of course, who never do miss. 

 Who has not seen the whites of some boatman's eyes, so piously exposed in 

 pity, after some quite excusable miss ? 



" Well, it was sixty yards off if it was a dozen, and on the right-hand 

 side of the boat," you say by way of exculpation. 



" Aye, aye, sir ; but I counts a bird dead at eighty, if 1 once claps eyes 

 on him ; you ought to have got him, and no mistake." 



"Then take the gun and get one yourself," is your angry rejoinder, as 

 another Wader comes twisting into range. 



Bang ! Bang ! No result so far as you can see, but your boatman has 

 better eyesight. " Peppered her nicely just in front of the tail," he explains 

 quite cheerfully ; " she won't go far, I warrant ; look how she's heeling over 

 even now ! " 



You see no signs of any heeling over, nor, in fact, of anything unusual 

 in the bird's flight, but you feel also that a valued reputation is at stake, 

 and having had your own self-esteem restored to you by what was in reality 

 a palpable miss, you gracefully accept the man's version, and agree with him 

 in everything save the somewhat half-hearted proposal to "weigh anchor 

 and go after her." For myself, I confess without any false shame that I 

 miss far more often than I hit. I regard myself as a moderate shot when on 

 the spot ; if off it i.e., if handicapped by a liver or any extraneous incubus, 

 such as a supercilious gamekeeper or a boatman most people would de- 

 scribe me as bad outright. 



