CHAPTER XXV 
THE GREAT BUSTARD (Continued) 
Tue following illustrates in outline a day’s bustard-shooting and 
incidentally shows how strongly haunted these birds are, each 
pack to its own particular locality. 
On reaching our point (a seventeen-kilometres’ drive), the 
scouts sent out the day before reported three bands numbering 
roughly forty, forty, and sixteen—in all nearly a hundred birds. 
The nearest lot was to the west. These we found easily, and 
B. F. B. got a brace, right-and-left, without incident. 
Riding back eastwards, the second pack had moved, but we 
shortly descried the third, in two divisions, a mile away. It 
being noon, the bustards were mostly lying down or standing 
drowsily, and we halted for lunch before commencing the 
operation. 
During the afternoon we drove this pack three times, secur- 
ing a brace on first and third drives, while on the second the 
birds broke out to the side. : 
Now bustards are, in Spanish phrase, muy querenciosos, 1.e. 
attached to their own particular terrain; and as in these three 
drives we had pushed them far beyond their much-loved limit, 
they were now restless and anxious to return. 
Already before our guns had reached their posts for a fourth 
drive, seven great bustards were seen on the wing, and a few 
minutes later the remaining thirty took flight, voluntarily, the 
whole phalanx shaping their course directly towards us. The 
outmost gun was still moving forward to his post under the crest 
of the hill, and the pack, seeing him, swerved across our line 
below, and (these guns luckily having seen what was passing 
and taken cover) thus lost another brace of their number. 
The bustards shot to-day (January 16), though all full-grown 
males, only weighed from 253 to 2634 lbs. apiece. Two months 
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