Warwick Woodlands: Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago

by Henry William Herbert

And so indeed it was--for there, upon the wall-top, where he had been balancing, Chase had contrived to lie down at the gunshot--wagging his stern slightly to and fro, with his white forepaws hanging down, and his head couched between them, his haunches propped up on the coping stone, and his whole attitude apparently untenable for half a minute.

"Now, load away for pity's sake, as quickly as you can; that posture must be any thing but pleasant."

This was soon done; inasmuch as the Commodore is not exactly one to dally in such matters; and when his locks ticked, as he drew the hammers to half-cock, Chase quietly dismounted from his perch, and Shot's head and fore-paws appeared above the barrier; but not till Archer's hand gave the expected signal did the stanch brutes move on.

"Come, Shot, good dog--it is but fair you should have some part of the fun! Seek dead! seek dead! that's it, sir! Toho! steady! Fetch him, good lad! Well done!"

In a few minutes' space, four or five more birds came to bag--they had run, at the near report, up the wall side among the bushes, and the dogs footed them along it, now one and now another taking the lead successively, but without any eagerness or raking looking round constantly, each to observe his comrades' or his master's movements, and pointing slightly, but not steadily, at every foot, till at the last all three, in different places, stood almost simultaneously--all three dead points.

One bird jumped up to Frank, which he knocked over. A double shot fell to the Commodore, who held the centre of the line, and dropped both cleverly--the second, a long shot, wing-tipped only. Harry flushed three and killed two dean, both within thirty paces, and then covered the third bird with his empty barrels--but, though no shot could follow from that quarter, he was not to escape scot free, for wheeling short to the left hand, and flying high, he crossed the Commodore in easy distance, and afterward gave Forester a chance.

"Try him, Frank," halloaed Archer--and "It's no use!" cried A---, almost together, just as he raised his gun, and levelled it a good two feet before the quail.

But it was use, and Harry's practiced eye had judged the distance more correctly than the short sight of the Commodore permitted--the bird quailed instantly as the shot struck, but flew on notwithstanding, slanting down wind, however, towards the ground, and falling on the hill-side at a full hundred yards.

"We shall not get him," Forester exclaimed; "and I am sorry for it, since it was a good shot."

"A right good shot," responded Harry, "and we shall get him. He fell quite dead; I saw him bounce up, like a ball, when he struck the hard ground. But A---'s second bird is only wing-tipped, and I don't think we shall get him; for the ground where he fell is very tussockky and full of grass, and if he creeps in, as they mostly will do, into some hole in the bog-ground, it is ten to one against the best dog in America!"