372 Unexplored Spain 



for half an hour) pray each moment for relief and the signal to 

 fire. No ! Our fowler-friends shoot for a livelihood, and continue, 

 with marvellous skill and patience, so to manoeuvre their beasts 

 that the utmost possible target shall finally be presented to the 

 broadside. There is no hurry — nor time nor aching vertebrae 

 with them count one centimo. (See photo at p. 90.) 



Should it be necessary to change course, that operation is 

 efi'ected by wheeling the pony stern-on to the fowl, the fowler 

 meanwhile crouching low under his muzzle : critical moments 

 ensue during which the expert has no cover but the pony's 

 breadth— instead of his length — to shield him from detection by 

 hundreds of the keenest eyes on earth. But it is remarkable 

 how little notice is taken of what is necessarily in full view 

 provided' , that the exposed objects are heyieath the covering 

 animal. Once let a human head or a gun-barrel appear above 

 its outline and the spell is broken. But otherwise — say during 

 those interludes of feigned " grazing " — the suffering fowlers can 

 straighten their backs by squatting down (in the water !) and 

 thus enjoy at closest quarters a spectacle of wild creatures that 

 is impossible to attain by any other means yet discovered. 

 Though the fowlers are now fully visible, framed, as it were, 

 beneath the cahresto's belly and between his legs, no notice will 

 be taken or any alarm created so long as the pony's skylines 

 remain unadorned with human appendages. There, within a 

 score of yards, you sit face to face with ducks by the hundred, 

 feeding, splashing, preening — all utterly unconcerned ! Those 

 of our readers who are most familiar with wildfowd will best 

 realise how incredible such a statement must read. Ordinarily, 

 the slightest visible movement — the mere glint of a gun-barrel 

 though half masked by cover — suffices to shift every duck at 

 one hundred yards and more. Here they ignore objects practi- 

 cally exposed and close at hand. Apparently the habitual 

 companionship day by day of water-bred ponies has annihilated 

 in their minds all sense of danger arising from such a quarter. 



The Spanish professionals (using large but antiquated muzzle- 

 loaders) work singly, each man behind his own pony ; or should 

 two or more join forces for a broadside, there still remains but 

 one man behind each animal. These men are reputed to have 

 made extraordinary shots ; and having viewed their infinite 

 patience, we can well believe such records. To place two guns 



