66 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING. 
main in the stubble fields all day in damp or cloudy 
weather, unless driven out by beating, and as they are 
then very tame, a person may approach them to within a 
few feet before they flush. The result is, that his bag is 
generally heavy, for the cool air and exercise brace up his 
nerves to such a pitch that he may score with his right and 
left barrels, in the majority of cases, without much trouble. 
Later in the season, that is, from about the last of Oc- 
tober to the latter end of December, the middle of the 
day is an excellent time for pursuing them, as they like 
to bask in the sun in open places; but as they are very 
wild, strong on the wing, and fly rapidly, 1t requires 
good shooting and hard hitting to kill them. When 
flushed, if the day is cold and the wind blustry, they 
may fly ten miles or more before they alight. It takes 
No. 6 shot and a good choke-bore to bring them down at 
that time, whereas, No. 8 or 9 is fully large enough in 
the early part of the season. 
They seem to be wilder in cloudy or rainy than in fine 
weather, late in the autumn, for they take wing almost 
as soon as they hear the human voice or detect the pres- 
ence of a dog, but on sunny days they will often 
permit the animal to approach them to within fifteen 
or twenty yards, as if they were too lazy to fly, or 
revelled so much in the sunshine that they disliked leay- 
ing the spots where its warm rays fell. When they do 
rise, however, it is with a startling whirr, and as soon as 
they fairly get on the wing they scud away at such a rate 
of speed that it requires a close, hard-hitting gun to stop 
them. Most of the birds spring from their shelter on 
hearing the voice, or the report of a gun, but several may 
stay behind, and as these often rise singly before a dog, a 
man can grass the majority of them. When the ground 
is covered with snow, they may be readily found in the 
timber, as they keep cackling, crooning, and chattering 
to one another, like the domestic fowls when roosting. 
