INDIAN SUMMER 229 



great art is to give even shooting through the day, 

 and to distribute sport evenly among the guns, with- 

 out favouritism unless, indeed, orders are that the 

 cream of the sport must pass the way of an important 

 personage. If a keeper, for reasons of his own, 

 should wish the bulk of the game to go to one quarter, 

 he can manage this by retarding one end of the line 

 of beaters, or by ordering certain beaters to tap with 

 their staves more vigorously than the others and 

 by this stratagem his partiality is hidden completely 

 from the sportsmen. 



A late spell of midsummer heat makes it seem as 

 though summer indeed has lingered in the woods. 

 With the oak-trees still heavily canopied 

 Indian w ith green leaves, the season of pheasant- 

 shooting seems an anomaly. A varied 

 bunch of wild flowers may be picked, many belonging 

 to June rather than to the months of nuts and berries. 

 Primroses bloom freely. Flowers are to be found 

 everywhere, and cottage gardens are ablaze with 

 Michaelmas and tall yellow daisies and dahlias ; the 

 coming of the first keen frost will mean a floral 

 massacre. On hedges laden with blackberries and the 

 red bryony berries there are sprays of honeysuckle, 

 and there are many bright blooms of scabious, knap- 

 weed, corn-poppy, daisy, harebell, violet, and scarlet 

 pimpernel. Even some of the old cock pheasants 

 seem to imagine that April has come, judging by 



