174 SNIPE SHOOTING. 



a most capricious resident, changing his abode at 

 almost every accident of wind or weather, or both. 

 Sometimes not one solitary individual is to be met 

 with in their most accustomed haunts ; sometimes a 

 sportsman falls in with a colony, where he never 

 before knew an individual of the species to resort. 



Many good game-shots contend, that shooting 

 snipes is a " knack" (which, no doubt, they them- 

 selves have not learned) ; and, certainly, some emi- 

 nent hands, at pheasants and partridges, give it up in 

 disgust, and despair of ever succeeding at it. Taken 

 in all its bearings, this sport is a very true general 

 test of a marksman's quality. The flight of the bird 

 is utterly altered by the state of the weather. In 

 warm, cloudy, or boisterous days, he is as tame, and 

 as easily covered, as a young grouse in August ; the 

 next morning, with a brisk hoar-frost, and a still, 

 clear atmosphere, he flashes away like a bolt from a 

 cross-bow gyrating like a swallow in the twilight. 



An old stanch pointer, familiar with the scent of 

 the snipe, is the only dog to shoot him to with any 

 satisfaction. This dog should be taught to retrieve 

 also, for in some grounds which the bird likes best to 

 frequent, it is not competent for " too, too solid flesh" 

 to venture. " Snipes," says Captain Lacy, whom 

 we hold in esteem as an authority on the subject of 

 shooting birds which are not game, " snipes lie best 

 in windy weather, when the shooter should always be 

 down wind, as the birds, when sprung, generally face 

 it, and thus present finer, and often cross, shots. 



