252 BIRD LIFE IN ENGLAND. 



of game maintained on the moors, or from what reason it is 

 hard to say, but certain it is that in an ordinarily fine season, 

 when the birds are fairly early, by the beginning of Sep- 

 tember they grow as wild as hawks, and form themselves 

 into large packs, either rising far out of gunshot, or some- 

 times to be seen running some five hundred yards away, 

 ready to rise at the slightest step towards them, and fly a 

 mile or more, only to pursue the same tactics again, should 

 the sportsmen be ill advised enough to follow them. But 

 the sport which has cost so much cannot be abandoned as 

 hopeless after a fortnight or three weeks, and the old-fashioned 

 plan of sending a steady old dog to head off the pack, till his 

 master got near enough for a shot, would be far too tame 

 and slow for modern ideas, and by no means productive of 

 the big bags so much desired, and thus almost of necessity 

 has come the practice of " driving " little turf-built shelters 

 concealing the sportsmen, who thus lie in ambush, while an 

 army of beaters, marching across the heather, drive the grouse 

 in flocks over their heads. A steady hand, a cool head, and a 

 quick eye are all pre-eminently necessary for this mode of 

 shooting, which, distasteful as it is to many of the old school, 

 is by no means the cockney sport it is sometimes stigmatized 

 as being. There is no catching the bird as he poises on his 

 turn from the perpendicular to the horizontal flight ; straight 

 overhead, with a rush like an express train, goes the flight, 

 the strong old cocks leading, and these it is the sportsman's 

 aim to pick off, for it is well known that shooting down the 

 old cocks is the best possible means of insuring a good stock 

 on the moors in the following years. And thus the grouse 

 drive has its own advantages and its own fascinations for 

 the sportsman, though the comfortable shelters, the chairs, 

 the luncheon, often attended by the ladies of the house-party, 

 and served by elaborate flunkies, are apt to waken the disdain 

 of old men accustomed to tramp for long hours behind a 

 staunch dog, with nothing but a sandwich and a drop of 

 whisky at the midday halt by the spring. 



