190 TEN YEARS OF GAME-KEEPING 
imposing] pistol grip) did not work properly. And 
small wonder, for the lever was glued to its seat 
by a layer of rust. After considerable excavations 
with a{knife, we got the lever to work; and we 
explained that the weapon was not an ordinary 
gun, but a fowling-piece, whereat the shooter 
seemed mightily pleased. 
Some shooters will go to big expense in guns 
and cartridges, yet do not see their way to have 
a serviceable cartridge-bag. A lord turned up at 
a shoot, and brought with him in a brougham 
(by the way, I am certain I could not shoot 
after arriving in a brougham) a high-grade gun 
and expensive cartridges; but so dilapidated was 
his cartridge-bag that before it could be used it 
had to be tied up, like a rat-gnawed sack, with 
bits of string begged from the beaters. Another 
well-to-do shooter had a cartridge-bag that re- 
sembled one of the cheaper makes of satchel 
carried by children to school. Whether he feared 
he might lose cartridges or bag, or both, I cannot 
say, but he persisted in carrying his bag all day. 
It was at a covert shoot on a damp day, and 
when this shooter reached his stand he would 
place his bag tenderly on the sodden ground. 
Never shall I forget the struggle with sticky 
cartridges during the greater part of the best 
rise of pheasants. 
Beware of the man in weird raiment; avoid him, 
