148 How I Became a Sportsman. 



good, we found them of little use to us. What 

 we ought to have taken was a good steady 

 setter ; old Sancho would have done admirably. 

 By the way, I have always found the Irish 

 setter better adapted for snipe-shooting than 

 any other breed, they have such a quiet, 

 stealthy, panther-like gallop, and wet ground 

 seems to suit them exactly. 



My next venture on Dartmoor was upon a 

 part which I had rented for a few seasons. This 

 had been preserved for years, and here we 

 always had fair sport, including a very nice 

 head of partridges ; but this was not on Dart- 

 moor forest proper, but on the borders of it, 

 where there were many cultivated patches of 

 ground. Still, much of the ground was of the 

 same character as the moor itself; there was a 

 sprinkling of game of most kinds, and in the 

 season plenty of snipe and woodcocks. There 

 were several nice coverts on the place, besides a 

 lot of rushy, moist ground covered with short 

 bushes, with small streams of water running 

 through, just the very place for cocks — and 

 cocks there always were. It seemed a favourite 

 feeding-ground for them, as proved by their 

 borings, and also a pleasant place to lie quiet 



