COVERT-SHOOTING 269 



bird for the gun, until he is flying towards his 

 home. 



On this short and simple maxim every 

 good rise of pheasants in the country is 

 based. 



Drive out your pheasants from their 

 native wood into other woods, into 

 spinneys, copses, rough-grown common, 

 heather, turnip-fields, into any form of 

 cover, natural or artificial, that can be 

 found to hold them, and should the 

 country be as flat as a pancake, they 

 will stiU make good birds for the guns 

 when homewards bound. A host of 

 other details, of course, go to the making 

 of a good rise, but they are all subordinate 

 to the one essential that we have all seen 

 neglected so often. Perhaps the next 

 point in importance is, having got your 

 pheasants where you want them, to flush 

 them far enough away from the guns to 

 give them a chance of flying well. 



The one objection which may be urged 

 — apart from the fact of the woods having 

 been shot in the wrong way for the last 



