HORSE Y DISTRICT 201 



puss would certainly have escaped, but she is added to the 

 bag and the beaters proceed. 



" At the far end of the osiers flourished a nice clump of 

 trees with good undergrowth ; surrounding it as best we can 

 we send in the beaters and dogs. The sport this covert 

 affords is excellent while it lasts, but is over all too soon. On 

 counting up the spoil we find we have added two and a half 

 brace of pheasants, three hares and four rabbits to the bag. 



" Having carefully concealed the game in the osier bed, 

 and covered it over with sticks and stones, we start to beat 

 the marshes, a long stretch of which lie before us as far as 

 the eye can see. 



" These marshes are what are commonly known in Norfolk 

 as litter marshes. They are favoured by game and water- 

 fowl, and the shooting they afford is very pretty. In extent 

 they average about five or six acres each, more or less. On 

 all sides they are bounded by deep dykes, the bottoms of 

 which seem unfathomable, and they are intersected throughout 

 by smaller drains. In the district where we were shooting 

 the drainage at the time was anything but good, and the 

 marshes were mostly flooded. Some were completely covered 

 by water, others had large pools standing on them here and 

 there, whilst all the dykes were full to the overflowing. 



" Walking the first marsh down wind (the best way for 

 snipe), we bag a leash of birds, a hare and two snipe, one 

 of which is a jack. This is a good beginning, and we can 

 hardly expect to keep up such an average. 



" When about midway over the marshes we came to a 

 patch which looked bare because there were no rush clumps 

 for some ten or fifteen yards, and that portion of the marsh, 

 comparatively speaking, was as smooth as the putting-green 

 on a golf link. Our friend startled a hare from the rushes, 

 which dodged in and out the clumps in such a manner 

 that he could not get a satisfactory shot at her. As she 

 crossed this open space she flushed a jack snipe, and with 

 a smartness which met with warm approbation he very 

 neatly killed both of them by an almost simultaneously-fired 



