The Water-fowl of the Pacific Coast 537 



suspicions, and they came in so high that even a 

 floating battery would have been seen by most of 

 them. By having a few small floats and sticks 

 out in the water, at distances already tested with 

 the rifle, I had some fine shooting from a patch of 

 brush on one bank ; but at every shot the whole 

 pond shook with a heavy roar of wings, and I had 

 to wait for a new lot, which would alight, probably, 

 in a different place. As the shooting was rarely 

 under three hundred yards, and the aim had to be 

 taken at a single goose, there was no certainty 

 about it, even with globe-sights. But it made 

 elegant rifle shooting, and there is no way in 

 which such fine fun may be had with the goose 

 This could then be done in any of the larger 

 ponds, and at almost any time of day one could 

 get plenty of shots at geese out on the plains, — 

 though you had no way of fixing the distance, 

 which kept ever changing. 



Though I have known the goose forty years, 

 and seen him in the wildest places, I have never 

 seen the time when one on foot could approach 

 within shot-gun range except under some kind of 

 cover. Once in a long while a flock seems stupid, 

 so that some may be killed with a long shot, but 

 the rule is quite the other way. And even a 

 blind from which to shoot along one of their lines 

 of flight must be something natural if it shows 

 above ground. And a cut or gully is better even 



