89 
AND AMERICAN RURAL SPORTS. 
Delaware canal, numbers of sportsmen resort thither as a 
favourite place for shooting Snipe; at times they are scarce 
even in this place, and then again in vast numbers, so that 
the indefatigable sportsman is often rewarded for his ex- 
pense and toil. When this spot was first resorted to, for 
the purpose of shooting Snipe, I have been informed, that, 
so great a multitude of these birds have congregated in 
places, as to rival black-birds in the size of their flocks. 
The Snipe pass the middle States by the latter end of 
April, and reach their place of incubation, in the more 
northern climate, in the early part of May, where they 
remain until October, whence they return, and again afford 
amusement to our sportsmen, during the Indian Summer; 
at this period they are generally more fat and tender than 
in the spring, being mostly young birds. They finally 
return to the southern States, and winter in the marshy and 
rice grounds, with which those States abound. 
Although these birds are strictly migratory, there are 
instances when they remain with us through both summer 
and winter, as I have several times shot them in the heat 
of the former, and the severities of the latter. 
In habit, the Snipe is a solitary bird, and performs its 
journey alone, but, as has been stated before, they concen- 
trate in particularly rich feeding grounds, in such quanti- 
ties, that when disturbed, their rise is so simultaneous, as 
to have the appearance of flocks, and they will hover 
around in large bodies, unwilling to leave the spot, until 
they either disperse, or settle again in the grass, but their 
arrival at, and departure from, these places, is solitary. 
When this game is plentiful, I would advise the young 
sportsman, by all means, to practice on it in preference to 
any other; it is clear shooting, no objects interpose to dis- 
concert the mind, and direct it from the game; conse- 
quently, there is more time for deliberation. No. 9 shot, 
is sufficiently large for the purpose, as it requires but a 
slight wound to bring them to the ground — and one day’s 
exercise with prudence, after these birds, will initiate the 
beginner into the science of shooting, more completely, 
than practising a whole week at useless swallows, or slug- 
gish rail. j. 
REPLY TO “ SPORTSMAN.” 
Messrs. Editors, 
Your correspondent, the « Sportsman,” has evinced so 
much courtesy in his remarks on my essay on Chesapeake 
Duck Shooting, that, though differing in sentiment, I feel 
much pleasure in replying to his “Stricture.” With 
respect to his first observation, on the principle of aiming 
in advance of a bird, when at a great distance, the necessity 
of it has been so much an axiom with old duck shooters, 
that every argument with them would fail in overturning 
it. I imagine, from the sentiments of your correspondent, 
that his practice has been principally with ordinary game; 
where the rapidity of flight and distance of object have been 
so materially different from the case assumed by myself, 
that a comparison can scarcely be drawn. 
With a partridge or woodcock, the nearness of the object, 
and the comparative slowness of progression, destroy the 
necessity for any sensible difference in the direction of 
aim; for, it has been computed that these birds fly at the 
rate of from thirty to forty feet in a second of time, and being 
generally shot at within sixty yards distance, the spread of 
the load will cover all deficiency. 
With a bird at eighty or one hundred yards, whose 
motion is nearly ninety feet in that time, there can 
be no doubt of the absolute necessity for a certain allow- 
ance. Throwing aside the spreading of the shot, and 
estimating the load but as a single mass like a bullet, the 
subject assumes a more simple shape, and it is thus I will 
consider it. If the shooter ceases to move his gun when 
he begins to pull the trigger, there can be no question of the 
loss of time even with the most rapid motion of the lock; 
but I will take the fairest position of the matter, and allow 
that the gun is still covering the bird when the load is 
actually at .the muzzle. The diagram before us, will assist 
in explaining the philosophy of the subject. 
I will consider A the breech of the 
gun, which is, for all purposes, suf- 
ficiently a point or centre of motion, 
and B the muzzle. A C the posi- 
tion of the gun when the shooter 
commences the operation of firing, 
E the bird at that moment; and ta- 
king a course that will bring it when 
at its nearest point, at a distance of 
one hundred yards from the person. 
We will suppose, although the relative proportions of dis- 
tance are not accurate in the design, that the process of 
pulling the trigger, and the passage of the load from the 
breech to the muzzle, occupies one second of time, and that 
during that interval, the muzzle has travelled to B, which 
we will assume as ten feet, the length of the barrel, of 
course changing the arc, and the bird has arrived at F, or 
eighty-seven feet beyond E. Allowing the load to be 
attached to the muzzle, and the same rate of motion con- 
tinued, it would be under the influence of a power of a 
momentum of ten feet in a second, and which, in another 
second would carry it to D. But presuming this momen- 
tum was received, and the attachment to the gun destroyed, 
