160 TEN YEARS OF. GAME-KEEPING 
unexpectedly one evening at the end of January. 
It rained and blew horribly, and so I set out for 
three clumps of trees on a hill, thinking that I 
might come to terms with an old reprobate of a 
cock pheasant who haunted the hill when he went 
up to roost. However, while I was waiting to hear 
him go up I saw some pigeons flying low against 
the wind, to roost, as I supposed, in a large wood 
beyond my boundary. I stood on the fringe of the 
clump nearest which I hoped they might pass. 
Would they come within shot? I wondered. As 
luck would have it, they tacked to gain the shelter 
of that very clump. I shot two, and very soon saw 
that I was in for something good. They came in 
flocks of a dozen to twenty, and all tacked for my 
clump. What a fine time I had for a few minutes! 
Sometimes I got one, occasionally two, and once 
or twice none, which I did not know-how to account 
for. They were quite near enough, but gave 
tricky shots, and the light, apart from the blurring 
effect of the wind and rain, was not good. It was 
necessary to be pretty quick to get in two barrels, 
for being exposed to the full view of the pigeons, 
directly 1 put up my gun the whole lot would swirl 
sideways and sweep down wind. I got twenty-two, 
seven of which my dog found on the way home. 
I never saw or heard anything of the old cock 
pheasant, with whom, in consideration of the luck 
