178 WARWICK WOODLANDS. 



said Toci. "But come, boys, let's be stirrin', else they'll 

 git together like; they keeps drawin', drawin', "into one 

 place now, I can hear." 



No sooner said than done; we were all on foot in an 

 instant, and ten minutes brought us to the edge of the 

 first thicket; and here was the truth of Harry's precepts 

 tested by practice in a moment; for they had not yet 

 entered the thin bushes, on which now the red leaves hung 

 few and sere, before old Shot threw his nose high into the 

 air, straightened his neck and his stern, and struck out 

 at a high trot; the other setter evidently knowing what 

 he meant, though as yet he had not caught the wind of 

 them. In a moment they both stood steady; and, almost 



at the same instant, Tom Draw's Dash, and A 's 



Grouse came to the point, all on different birds, in a bit 

 of very open ground, covered with wintergreen about knee 

 deep, and interspersed with only a few scattered bushes. 



Whir-r-r — up they got all at once! what a jostle — what 

 a hubbub! Bang! bang! crack! bang! crack bang! Four 

 barrels exploded in an instant, almost simultaneously; and 

 two sharp unmeaning cracks announced that, by some 

 means or other, Frank Forester's gun had missed fire 

 with both barrels. 



"What the deuce is the matter, boys!" cried Harry, 

 laughing, as he threw up his gun, after the hubbub had 

 subsided, and dropped two birds — the only two that fell, 

 for all that waste of shot and powder. 



"What the deuce ails you?" he repeated, no one reply- 

 ing, and all hands looking bashful and crest-fallen. "Are 

 you all drunk ? or what is the matter ? I ask merely for 

 information." 



"Upon my life! I believe / am!" said Frank Forester. 

 "For I have not loaded my gun at all, since I killed those 

 two last snipe. And, when we got up from luncheon, I 

 put on the caps just as if all was right — but all is right 

 now," he added, for he had repaired his fault, and loaded, 



before A or fat Tom had done staring, each in the 



other's face, in blank astonishment. 



"Step up to Grouse, then," said Archer, who had never 

 taken his eye off the old brown pointer, while he was 

 loading as fast as he could. "He has got a bird, close 



