"You
must shoot, Frank, like lightning, to kill these beggars; they are the
ruffed grouse, though they call them partridge here: see! are they not
fine fellows?"
Another hour's beating, in which we still kept picking up, from time to
time, some scattering birds, brought us to the spring head, where we
found Tim with luncheon ready, and our fat friend reposing at his side,
with two more grouse, and a rabbit which he had bagged along the
covert's edge. Cool was the Star champagne; and capital was the cold
fowl and Cheshire cheese; and most delicious was the repose that
followed, enlivened with gay wit and free good humor, soothed by the
fragrance of the exquisite cheroots, moistened by the last drops of the
Ferintosh qualified by the crystal waters of the spring. After an hour's
rest, we counted up our spoil; four ruffed grouse, nineteen woodcocks,
with ten brace and a half of quail beside the bunny, made up our score--
done comfortably in four hours.
"Now we have finished for to-day with quail," said Archer, "but we'll
get full ten couple more of woodcock; come, let us be stirring; hang up
your game-bag in the tree, and tie the setters to the fence; I want you
in with me to beat, Tim; you two chaps must both keep the outside--you
all the time, Tom; you, Frank, till you get to that tall
thunder-shivered ash tree; turn in there, and follow up the margin of a
wide slank you will see; but be careful, the mud is very deep, and
dangerous in places; now then, here goes!"
And in he went, jumping a narrow streamlet into a point of thicket,
through which he drove by main force.
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