SNIPE 



among those constantly engaged in snipe-shooting, 

 can reckon upon seeing single specimens more than 

 once or twice in -three or four seasons. There are 

 not a few sportsmen who have killed fair numbers of 

 common snipe or jack-snipe without having had the 

 luck to bag their "double" cousin, the great snipe. 



Few forms of gunning are more delightful than 

 snipe-shooting. The suddenness with which these birds 

 so unexpectedly present themselves ; the twisting diffi- 

 culties of their flight ; the knowledge that they will 

 rise sometimes within easy shot, at another just beyond 

 range ; the shrill cry, in itself somewhat unsteadying, 

 with which the bird springs up from its boggy resting- 

 place all these things tend to make snipe-shooting 

 one of the most painfully delightful of all forms of 

 sport. Upon some days the birds will get up in the 

 pleasantest fashion possible, one after the other rising 

 from the bog within easy shot, and affording each time 

 a fair chance to the sportsman. Another day they are 

 exasperating even to madness, getting up just beyond 

 reach, twisting and shifting upon the wing in such a 

 fashion that old hands even will miss more than half 

 their shots, and lose alike their patience and their 

 temper. One day they are here in a heap, the next 

 they have sailed elsewhere. You never know quite 

 how to take these shifty, unaccountable little creatures. 

 Yet, as the devoted snipe-shooter well knows, there 

 is no species of game, spite of these and other draw- 

 backs, which continues to offer, year in, year out, so 

 constant a fascination to its pursuers. Calmness and 

 control of nerves are above all things to be studied 

 in snipe-shooting ; the hurried, the over-eager, and 

 the nervous gunner is more than ordinarily handi- 

 capped when in pursuit of the wily snipe. 



For the perfection of snipe-shooting we must seek 



313 



