60 SHOOTING WILD FOWL. 



them, and in these great thickets the birds lie close all day. When 

 night comes, however, they rise and seek the cultivated open lands, 

 where the soil is soft and loamy, and where they feed, as they do 

 here, on. the worms that find their natural breeding places in such 

 soil. The outfit ot a fire-hunter before the war consisted of a gun, a 

 big pine-knot torch, and the strongest slave on the plantation. 

 iSmce the war the slave has been left out of the outfit, but the tradi 

 tion is preserved by hiring some muscular darkey to perform his 

 duties. The torch might more appropriately be called a pillar of 

 fire, for it is a fire made of the fattest kind of pine-knots in a large 

 iron wickerwork cage, secured to one end of a stout pole twelve or 

 fifteen feet high, and carried aloft by the negro. It casts a bright 

 light over an area of several rods around. The hunter or hunters, 

 as soon as it is dark, proceed to the wood -cock ground. The torch 

 bearer lights his pine-knots and walks slowly along, The hunter 

 follows closely. In the bright light he soon sees the lustrous, stal- 

 ing eyes of the wood-cock, disturbed in its feeding, fixed with a 

 startled look and apparent fascination on the glaring torch. Some 

 hunters will not wait for the bird to rise, but will kill it as it sits. 

 The more scientific gunner waits till it risec with its peculiar cry, 

 and brings it down by a, quick shot. Tho shot hac got to be quick, 

 too, for the bird is seen but a second as it flashes upv/ard, and ic then 

 lost in the darkness beyond the boundaries of the torch rays To 

 bring down a wood-cock before it escapee in Uic darkness requires a 

 hunter that Zmowc his business. It often happens that a scoro ex 

 birds will rise at the same time and whirr for an instant in the glare 

 of the torch, c.'iid co, generally- there are several hunters in. r, party, 

 and one evening's fire-hunting may result in tho oaring cf a hun- 

 dred birds or more." 



Snipe Shooting*, 



Snipe are to be met with in low mar shy "grounds. In spring they 

 disperse themselves to higher and more carp situations. Snipe- 

 shooting affords excellent diversion 5 but those who attempt it 

 should be possessed of c, strong constitution, and considerable forti- 

 tude and energy j wot and dirt must not be cared for, nor must tlie 

 coldness and severity of the weather bo hoeded= Snipe are difficult 

 to hit when on tho wing, owing to the irregular twistings of their 

 flight; but this difficulty is soon surmounted if the birds are allowed 



