UPLAND SHOOTING. 
251 
farmers will not grieve when they reflect that there will be, at 
any rate, by so much the fewer depredators on their corn-fields 
next autumn and winter, when it may truly be said, they are 
fruges consumere nati. Moreover, we must make the most of 
them now, for in six weeks they will change their character and 
habits so entirely, that by no ingenuity can we possibly get near 
enough for a shot; and the devils, though they now tumble 
over on the reception of two or three No. 8 shot, will then carry 
off as much lead as a Galena steamboat. It is astonishing how 
difficult the full-grown birds are to kill,—I have known them, 
when riddled with No. 4 shot, to fly entirely out of sight and 
leave you bending forward your neck, in hopes that as you have 
knocked off feathers enough, as it would seem, to fill a bolster, 
that straight and rapid flight must soon falter; but no, on goes 
the bird in a ‘ bee line/ till his figure melts into thin air,” &c. 
It is, indeed, sorry work, when a man who writes so very 
well, and who seems to possess very many of the genuine ideas 
and feelings of a sportsman, should condescend to promulgate 
such mischievous nonsense as the above. I note this the more 
willingly, because to such selfish sophistry, on the part of sports 
men, more than half the difficulty of preserving game is directly 
ftscribable. 
For who, if the sportsman shoots out of season, because it is 
easier to kill half-grown birds than full-grown ones, or because 
there are so many of them, that two or three score, or hundreds^ 
more or less, will not be missed, will abstain from doing like¬ 
wise ? Or how shall we, conscious of such a beam in our own 
eye, venture to extract the mote from our brother’s 1 
The arguments advanced—if arguments they can be called- 
in the above precious paper, are equally applicable to every 
other species of game that flies. 
The Quail is a very hard bird to stop when full-grown, and 
well on the wing, especially in wild weather, and thick covert— 
an infinitely harder bird, in proportion to its size, which makes 
it all the more difficult to hit, and precludes the possibility of 
using large shot, than the Grouse—but I am happy to say, that 
