PROSPECTING FOR WOODCOCK 
A Day in Massachusetts in Advance of the Open Season 
BY DR. GEORGE McALEER 
N upland game bird- 
shooting the golden 
plover—the earliest mi- 
| grant, the erratic Wil- 
¥/| son’s snipe, the swift- 
X: eNOS flying quail and the 
eK { wary ruffed grouse have 
at each their admirers who 
have not been slow to sing the praise of 
their favorite; but it goes without saying 
that for all that contributes fascination and 
charm to a day afield, no bird of them is 
such a general favoiite—all things being 
equal—as the woodcock—that sprite-like 
lover of bog and brake, of fern lands in 
birch and alder growths beside running 
brooks, and of the marge and ooze of 
swampy places. 
Another year has grown apace, and the 
tempered sun tells that summer is on the 
wane. Sportsman and bird dog anxiously 
await the opening day of the gunning 
season, September 1; but a vigorous man- 
hood and love for shooting on the wing and 
attendant pleasures make the day seem 
long distant and prompt an observation 
run to old and familiar haunts to note the 
prospects for the season’s shooting. An old 
friend of many adventures in upland and 
sea-fowl shooting and after big game in 
Maine and the Maritime Provinces dropped 
into my sanctum to while away a reminis- 
cent evening and to plan for the future. A 
day was soon settled on for this purpose 
when we were to take a.run into the foot- 
hills of old Wachusett, some dozen or more 
miles away—the highest elevation in 
Massachusetts east of the Connecticut 
- River, and dignified by the name of 
“mountain.” 
Here bubbling springs on the hillsides, 
and their offspring, purling brooks, and 
attendant conditions, make an ideal place 
for woodcock breeding, and good resting- 
place in flight time—and here many a time 

and oft have the sportsmen put in most 
delightful and successful days with dog and 
gun. 
As an entertainer and purveyor of 
valuable information, which is such a 
pleasurable concomitant of a trip, my com- 
panion has an enviable reputation, and 
whether deserved of not may be best judged 
by the following brief summary of his 
pronouncement en route, during a delightful 
morning’s drive: 
‘Down through all the years that have 
witnessed the building up of a broader, 
more tolerant and more genuine Christi- 
anity upon the ruins of the blindness, 
bigotry and unseemly prejudices of the 
past, in Massachusetts, the State has ever 
commanded for better or for worse her 
full share of attention from her sister 
States of the Union, in her struggle for bet- 
ter and nobler things. 
‘“These waves of advancement and retro- 
gression, of elevation and depression, these 
uplifts to the pure air of the sunlit hills and 
anon the backward swing of the pendulum 
to the noisome bogs and fens of the intoler- 
ant, turbulent, oppressive and repellant, 
well typify the broken, rolling, inharmoni- 
ous topography of the State. Here is the 
intolerant and repulsive marsh—the slough 
of despond in the landscape—that refuses 
entrance to human footsteps; there its 
antithesis, the clear and placid lake that 
truthfully mirrors the passing cloud as well 
as the clear blue sky above, as if to testify 
that ‘truth crushed to earth will rise again’; 
and beyond lies the obstinate, stony and 
sterile soil that can be subdued and ren- 
dered fairly fruitful only by seemingly 
endless patience, sacrifice and perseverance. 
‘“‘Again, here is the abandoned farm that 
mutely tells the tale of other times and other 
days, of unrewarded endeavor, of depriva- 
tions and hardships too great to be endured 
and possibly points to the want of Christian 

