^ail and Partridge 133 



color of frosted weeds. It is set among frosted 

 weeds, where partridges are known to use, 

 and commonly upon a day of mist mingled 

 with rain. After it is set, with a light screen 

 of brush over the mouth, the netters ride up 

 and down the field diagonally, coming gradu- 

 ally closer and closer to the net mouth. The 

 partridges see only the trampling hoofs, and 

 run gently a little further off. They run again 

 and yet again, until at last they come to an 

 odd light wall. It is a wing of the net. They 

 run down it, see the convenient cover of 

 bushes, scuttle through it, and run on — to 

 find themselves trapped a little further in. 



Netted birds are much the best for either 

 the table or the market, but anybody with a 

 drop of sportsman's blood, holds netting in 

 abhorrence. Some few who practise it salve 

 their consciences by turning out two pairs 

 of each covey netted. Neither nets nor coops 

 were permitted at White Oaks. Joe had built 

 a coop once when he was ten years old — 

 a three cornered tobacco-stick coop, with a 

 weighted roof of boards, and a tunnel running 

 down under the side of it, to come up in the 

 floor. He had baited it liberally with wheat 

 and dried peas, strewing the bait all along the 

 tunnel, and in a trail for yards outside. A 

 covey found the trail, fed through the tunnel, 

 and got inside the coop, then lacked the wit 



