“Oh, if you stick to small shot,” said Birger, who had despatched a human retriever down the watercourse to pick up the birds, “you may fire away in the men’s faces if you like; there is not a Swede who would not stand the chance of a peppered jacket, to be able to pick up an article of game,”—a sentiment fully confirmed by the grinning faces of the picket, for whose benefit he had translated his words.
“But we are not likely to have bears coming up to us, if we keep up such a popping as this,” said the Parson.
“‘A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush;’ if there are bears within the skal, depend upon it we shall get them, sooner or later. Fire away! most of us like a broiled grouse for supper.”
“Here goes for the bird of Yggdrasil,” as a magnificent peregrine falcon came floating through the air, as if by the mere act of volition; “he shall never sit again between the eyes of the eagle.”[53]
Birger had, however, miscalculated his distance, for the bird, taking no more notice of his shot than if they had been hailstones, sailed quietly on his course, without turning to the right or left.
“The bird of the gods bears a charmed life,” said the Parson, “it is no use firing at him. Come, load away! look sharp, or you will lose your next chance.”
Game, however, is nowhere very plentiful, either in Norway or in Sweden; and though every eye in the picket was on the look-out, nothing more was seen, except a blue Alpine hare, that came quietly lopping up the watercourse, and sat on its hind legs, innocently looking Matthiesen in the face during the minute and half in which he was taking aim; the shot, however, was successful at last, and puss was destined to supply the evening kettle.
“If you want a chance at big game,” said Birger, “I will tell you what you should do; it is altogether against the law, no doubt—and that is one of the few laws relating to skals that ought to be observed;—but if you were to slip down one of these watercourses with Torkel, and take your course quietly and silently through the fjeld, keeping four or five miles ahead of the dref, more unlikely things have happened than that you should set your eyes upon some beast or other stealing off. You have got your compass, and you cannot be lost in a little strip of a forest like this, not half a dozen miles across. Besides, every stream you come to runs from our pickets, which you may always reach by following it. You can always distinguish them in the day-time by their flags, and if you should be overtaken by night—”
“If I should,” said the Parson, “there is nothing I should like better. Torkel will soon get up a fire. I have plenty of provisions in my havresac, and a little of the contraband, too,” he added, shaking his bottle; “they forgot to search me; so that if we should be out at night, we will try if we cannot make a night of it.”