:66 SHOOTING THE PHEASANT 



failure is more due to the attitude of the bird towards 

 you, than to want of skill in the shooter, though there 

 is undoubtedly something which bothers you about 

 the look of him. When you come to analyse it, how- 

 ever, it is wonderful how his peculiar position towards 

 you protects him, and how little of him there is to 

 shoot at. His head and neck are there in profile, it 

 is true, but then comes the near wing incurved, motion- 

 less, each feather extended laterally towards you, and 

 protecting with its convex surface his whole body. 

 The other wing is hidden away from you on the other 

 side, protected again by the body ; the legs are tucked 

 up, and the tail goes for nothing. It follows then, as 

 I have no doubt in this instance the feathers of the 

 wing will deflect the pellets, that unless you break 

 the wing bone, which is also pointed towards you, and 

 therefore presents really an infinitesimal mark, you 

 have only the head and neck to shoot at. These, at 

 thirty-five or forty yards, will escape being vitally 

 struck in a large proportion of instances. When you 

 add to all this that there is something puzzling 

 about the pace and downward slope of the bird's 

 motion, I think you will have accounted for the fre- 

 quency of misses at this particular moment of the 

 pheasant's flight. You will observe the same skim- 

 ming pheasant killed regularly and easily when coming 



