THE GAME BIRDS OF INDIA, BURMA AND CEYLON. 19 



come to one of these little woods and arrange to work it from the 

 bottom upwards, one gun taking the centre and the other two the 

 edges. As the guest I am given the best place in the centre but 

 before we get into the wood itself two cock are put up from the 

 bracken at the edge of the swamp and are downed with a pretty 

 right and left by my host. No more birds are seen until we are 

 well inside the cover when a single bird gets up from the mossy bed 

 of the tiny stream just in front of me and is promptly bowled over. 

 A second gets up within a few yards but I miss badly and the bird 

 jinks away to my right and I hear the bang, bang of H., gun num- 

 ber three, a good shot who has doubtless accounted for him. 



For some time I get no more shots only putting up one bird 

 which flops out of my sight before I have time to take a snapshot at 

 him. The birds seem to be lying up in the holly bushes and 

 gorse on the edge of the copse and both my neighbours are get- 

 ting repeated shots and soon one of them missing a double 

 shot, turns a cock my way and he comes towards me in and 

 out of the trees with his curious owl-like flight and though he escapes 

 my first barrel the second brings him down almost on my head . I then 

 get a pheasant and miss another cock but finish up the beat with a nice 

 right and left at a pair of wood -pigeon. 



Counting our bag we find that B, our host, has six cock, a pheasant 

 and a rabbit, H. two pheasant and four cock and myself a pheasant, 

 two pigeon and two cock. 



Our next beat is a narrow strip composed of scrub and holly bushes 

 intermixed with a few bigger trees fringing a ditch of running water 

 which here and there widens out into small patches of bracken covered 

 swamp. This is too narrow for three guns, so B. goes ahead and stands 

 at the end, whilst we beat up to him. A start is made by H. with a 

 right and left at pheasant and we then walk half way through before 

 we get another shot and we begin to think the birds are not so thick 

 after all. Here however from a dense patch of holly bushes the dogs 

 put up four cock together and we have the pleasure of accounting for 

 all four though, to level matters, we each miss a comparative ly easy 

 shot immediately after. Yet again we have four birds in the air at the 

 same time but we only drop three, two are picked up at once and 

 whilst hunting round for the third another bird gets up between H. 

 and myself and flies straight towards me ; neither can shoot until he 



