CHAPTER VIII 
PHEASANTS: IN WAR 
To the keeper a pheasant is a pheasant—Wild v, hand-reared for 
shooting—Craftiness of wild birds—Little and big coverts—A 
keeper’s dodge—My first pheasant shoot—Bad guns make bad 
birds—A beater’s comment—Woods alter—Fog. 
PRovIDED it is a good one, I do not care a rap 
whether a pheasant is hand-reared or wild when I 
am shooting at it; and the better it is, the less I 
care. Who shall say of any pheasant whether it 
was in bondage bred or free? Certainly not the 
men who most often express an opinion on the 
antecedents of birds they have missed; neither 
can the keeper do better than guess. To him a 
pheasant is a pheasant in the shooting season, and 
so long as it puts in an appearance when shooting 
is going on, he does not care how or whence it 
came. However, he is always positive that every 
pheasant seen near the boundary is one of his tame 
birds. 
Wild pheasants are better than hand-reared birds 
for keeping up the stock for breeding. When you 
shoot through a wood at the end of the season 
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