The Great Bustard 249 



As the season advances the hunter's difficulties increase. The 

 brown earth becomes daily more and more naked, while files of 

 slow-moving ox-teams everywhere traverse the stubble, ploughing 

 league-long furrows twenty abreast. These factors combine to aid 

 the game and stretch to its utmost limit the venatic instincts 



o 



of the fowler. 



Let us now attempt to describe a day's bustard-driving on 

 scientific lines. The district having being selected, it is advisable 

 to send out the night before a trustworthy scout who will sleep at 

 the cortijv and be abroad with the dawn in order to locate pre- 

 cisely the various handadas, or troops of bustard, in the neigh- 

 bourhood. The shooting-party (three or four guns for choice, but 

 in no case to exceed six ') follow in the morning — riding, as a 

 rule, to the rendezvous ; though should there be a high-road 

 available it is sometimes convenient to drive (or nowadays even 

 to motor), having in that case sent the saddle-horses forward, 

 along with the scout, on the previous day. 



Arrived at the cortijo, the scout brings in his report, and at 

 once guns and drivers, all mounted, proceed towards the nearest 

 of the marked handadas. Not only are the distances to be 

 covered so great as to render riding a necessity, but the use of 

 horses has this farther advantage that bustard evince less fear 

 of mounted men and thus permit of nearer approach. The 

 drivers should number three — ^the centre to flush the birds, 

 two flankers to gallop at top speed in any direction should 

 the game diverge from the required course or attempt to break 

 out laterally. 



Ten minutes' ride and we are within view of our first handada 

 still a mile away. They may be feeding on some broad slope, 

 resting on the crest of a ridge, or dawdling on a level plain ; but 

 wherever the game may be — whatever the strategic value of their 

 position — at least the decision of our own tactics must be 

 clinched at once. No long lingering with futile discussion, no 

 hesitation, or continued spying with the glass is permissible. 

 Such follies instil instant suspicion into the astute brains on 

 yonder hill, and the honours of the first round pass to the 

 enemy. 



For this reason it is imperative to appoint one leader vested 



^ A large nuniber of liorseimn inevitiibly excites Misjiicion in game uiiacciistoined to see 

 more than tlivee or four men together. 



