UPLAND SHOOTING. 
307 
I was waiting for three or four in line, the wind blowing direct 
from me to them, without perceiving by any signs their con¬ 
sciousness of an enemy’s vicinity.* 
“ When the weather is very hard, and Ducks are driven to 
the springy drains, a simple way of getting fair shots, but seldom 
practised, is, to make your man keep close to the drain, and 
take your own place fifteen yards from it, and about forty in 
advance of him. The Ducks will then rise nearly opposite to 
you. To walk along the drain is not a very good plan, as they 
will generally rise either out of distance or very long shots: 
and, if you keep a little way off, they may not rise at all f 
When the loch is low, the sportsman may often get a capital 
shot at Ducks, the first warm sunny days in March,| as they 
collect on the grassy places at the margin to feed upon the 
insects brought into life by the genial heat. 
“ But to return to our wild-fowl shooter, whom we left glass 
in hand looking out for divers. He sees a couple plying their 
vocation fifteen or twenty yards from the shore, about half a 
quarter of a mile from where he stands. He selects his vantage 
* “ Perhaps the sportsman may ask what it signifies whether wild-fowl are 
aware of your approach by hearing or winding? My answer is, that although 
it is of little consequence when crawling upon Ducks, yet when lying concealed, 
expecting them to pitch, it is a considerable advantage to know that you will 
not be detected by their sense of smell; otherwise the best refuge for a shot 
must often be abandoned for a much worse.” 
t This plan will be found to answer admirably in this country, not when the 
weather is very hard, at which times the drains and small streams are frozen 
hard, but at all seasons when wild-fowl of any kind are marked down into any 
brook, stream or water-course whatever. If the stream be very tortuous, the 
shooter should walk parallel to it, just far enough distant not to strike any of its 
courses, but keeping as nearly as possible a perfectly direct course. The beater 
should follow every curve accurately. I have have had sport thus with Wood- 
duck, in many districts of the United States ; and once—the best day’s inland 
fowl-shooting, I ever had—killed sixteen young birds, and two fine Drakes in a 
single morning. 
t For March we must substitute, as regards American shooting, the corres¬ 
ponding season, according to the latitude. The period he means is the first 
breaking up of winter, and the commencement of mild weather. 
