124 SPORT. 



gathering, comprising, perhaps, youths from college, 

 Oxford dons, professors, and a foreign count or so, 

 there is sure to be danger. Out of a large country- 

 house party, when all are asked to shoot, some will 

 know their own incapacity and decline, but others, 

 especially the professors, will scorn the idea of any 

 disability, and accept with glee the unaccustomed 

 chance. 



I once asked one of these guests of doubtful sporting 

 character whether he cared to shoot. " Oh, yes," he 

 replied with avidity. " I'm a wretched bad shot, but 

 Vm. veiy fond of shooting.'' With a heavy heart — for 

 I had not the nerve to tell him what I ought to have 

 told him at once — to stay at home — I took the field 

 with him, and I believe it was some years before that 

 beat recovered the desolation which he dealt around 

 him. There happened to be a good many hares on it, 

 and he shot at all he saw, irrespective of distance. I 

 never saw him kill one, but he Jiit a great many, as he 

 himself with conscious pride informed me. I placed 

 this wretch at the end of a covert, where, being myself 



