98 CHAPTER XV. 



I had the better of this, because my man quite quickly mastered the 

 intricacies of the Remington auto-loading shotguns which were my 

 weapons, although he had never seen them before, and quite as quickly 

 he acquired the utmost facility in being where I wanted him with the 

 gun ready for my hand. My friend suffered not a little because his 

 garrulous old loader had notions of his own about the shooting; notions 

 which unfortunately neither corresponded to those of his principal nor 

 to the best usage as anyone would see it. 



The guns were apparently stationed ahead of us down the lane, and 

 we started toward them. We could see upon the slope which came down 

 from the right to the road a slope partly covered with stubble and 

 the other part made up of plowed ground a line of men, twenty or 

 thirty yards apart, as it were, a widely dispersed skirmish line, ad- 

 vancing toward the hedge which marked that flank of the lane to our 

 right. 



As we were getting on, a bird flashed through the air to our front 

 and swung out to the left with great quickness, but it was not sufficiently 

 quick to avoid a shot from the Chief's gun which brought it down dead. 

 A second and a third he killed in a similar manner. They were birds 

 breaking out from beyond the flank of the waiting sportsmen. I had 

 not loaded my gun and did not fire. 



By now we reached the rest of the party, to be designated, so far 

 as shooting men are concerned, hereafter as always under such cir- 

 cumstances, "the guns." There were eight guns; therefore* eight 

 loaders. My companions were all using double guns, as I should 

 myself if I were not doing my shooting with one hand. The automatic 

 does cut down the effect of the recoil. 



The eight guns of us were numbered off from right to left. One, 

 two, three, up to eight. The position of each gun was indicated by 

 the man in charge of the day's shooting. Usually we were about 

 forty to fifty yards apart, for the most part in a line and either behind 

 a hedge or a shoulder of the ground. 



In the first assignment of positions I was Number Eight, that is 

 the left flank man. We were facing east, a hedge in our front, then 

 a road, then another hedge, then a great wide field; turnips in first, 

 stubble beyond; on the far side, almost a mile away, the beaters to be 

 seen strung out, about twenty of them. 



