GROUSE AND BLACK-GAME SHOOTING. 7 



the young pack lying like stones; no birds are more 

 easily shot. 



The old cocks, even in August, are never very tame : 

 they are sometimes found singly; at others, in small 

 flocks, from six to ten. Their food on the moor consists 

 of cranberries; another berry, found in mossy places, 

 called in Scotland the " crawberry," and the seed of the 

 rush before named. They . being very strong on the 

 wing, have not the same reason as the young packs 

 for keeping near their food, and are often found far from 

 it, especially in the heat of the day ; shelter from the 

 sun being their chief object. There can then be no 

 better place to beat for them than among thick crops of 

 bracken. Should you find them in such good cover, 

 they will often give you a capital double shot. 



As the season advances, black-game are the wildest 

 of all birds. Fair open shooting at them is quite out of 

 the question. As they never eat heather,* their food on 

 the moors soon becomes scarce ; they then much more 

 frequent the stubble-fields and copses by the hill-sides. 

 You may often see twenty or thirty feeding together on 

 the sheaves, when the corn is first cut ; but exceedingly 

 alert for the approach of an enemy. I have seen them 

 doing the farmer as much injury as so many barn-door 



* Black-game when domesticated do eat heather, likewise grouse the 

 tops of birch, alder, &c. : this, in both cases, I believe to be an acquired 

 taste, as I have often opened their crops at different times during 

 the shooting season, and never once detected heather in those of black- 

 game, nor any thing except heather or corn in those of grouse. 



