154 SHOOTING THE PHEASANT 



slowly. By this I mean, not that the gun should not 

 be got off with frequency and rapidity, but that the 

 most accomplished and artistic performer will care 

 more for killing his pheasants properly than for 

 merely bringing a quantity to the ground at all 

 hazards. As I have ventured to say already, it is 

 an artificial pursuit altogether, and though you will 

 often find that the most apparently deliberate man 

 secures the largest result, it has not been so much 

 the large result, to which he is probably well accus- 

 tomed, but the style in which it is attained, that the 

 first-rate performer studies the most. 



From what I have said it follows that the crime 

 of taking your neighbour's bird is more heinous in 

 pheasant shooting than in the wilder forms of sport, 

 where the possible addition of a scarce bird to the 

 bag sometimes makes it pardonable. Standing in 

 the position I have described, take deliberately only 

 those which are well over your own ground, selecting 

 always the cocks as much as possible, and those 

 which are not too near you. If a bird is coming 

 straight to you out of or over the covert, and suddenly 

 deflects towards your neighbour as you are on the 

 point of shooting, you have the well-recognised right 

 to stick to him. But if he is passing you either 

 slanting or crossing straight, and although a poor 



