SMALL GAME 79 



on such and such a day " I felt too slack to go 

 after sable, so had a potter round for duck, and 

 bagged thirty couple in an hour, and real good fast 

 shooting too, when they got well up and on the 

 move from pool to pool ; quite a change from the 

 rifle, I assure you, and very nearly as exciting at 

 times," 



Or, " You ought to have been with me when the 

 sand-grouse came down to drink in the evening, 

 simply thousands of them, and top-hole shooting, 

 taking them on the wing ; twenty or thirty brace 

 was nothing as a bag, and they were not bad eating 

 either — a change indeed from the eternal buck-meat." 



The variety of small game is infinite — partridges 

 and pheasants altering in name and structure in 

 different countries ; duck and geese in wonderful 

 variety and numbers ; sand-grouse swarming like flies ; 

 snipe, hares, rabbits, pig, bustards, and guinea-fowl. 



Many of the smaller antelope and deer are desig- 

 nated as small game, but I prefer to place them 

 under the heading of their larger brethren, though it 

 is true they can more often be secured with a shot- 

 gun, especially those little chaps that inhabit long 

 grass, forested, or jungle country. 



Then they are best got at by driving with a dog 

 or natives, or by quietly walking along tracks and 

 keeping a sharp lookout for them feeding or stand- 

 ing like statues in the shadow of some tree or bush, 

 or may be with a sharp alarm-note going like 



