256 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING. 
holes,” sneak-boats, and sneak-boxes in a short time, 
and to know by intuition where danger lies. The most 
successful method of shooting them upon streams or 
lakes is to scull upon them down wind, as they must rise 
to the windward, and this may bring them within gun 
range before they can get on the wing. If I were to give 
a maxim for pursuing wild animals, I should say: Hunt 
quadrupeds up wind, and wild fowl down wind; keep out 
of sight as much as possible, and preserve the strictest 
silence. Study the haunts and habits of all creatures 
you desire to capture; be patient and persevering, rather 
than impetuous and eager; and do not destroy anything 
out of mere wantonness of spirit. 
The abundance of geese in the West and Southwest 
may be inferred from the fact that a man has been known 
to kill a thousand in a week with a muzzle-loading gun, 
and that another had to use a cart to take what he shot 
in two days to market. This was in Minnesota. A mean 
way of destroying them is practised in some portions of 
the Northwest. This is to soak corn in whiskey and 
scatter it in fields which they frequent. When they eat 
this they become helplessly intoxicated, and the men 
then go among them and knock them on the head with 
clubs. They often load cart after cart with them by this 
method, and send them to market, where they meet with 
a ready sale. I have known men to kill two hundred geese 
in a day with a muzzle-loader, by stalking them in a 
field under cover of a well-trained horse. These men did 
not bear directly down on the birds, but approached them 
obliquely, and very slowly, in order to lead them to sup- 
pose that no harm was intended, and when they got 
within shooting range they opened fire with huge wea- 
pons loaded with BB shot, and frequently bagged from 
ten to thirty in one round. After the volley, the surviv- 
ors rose in the air for a few moments and screamed their 
sense of annoyance at being disturbed, but after hover- 
