| PAGE | |
| [CHAPTER I.] | |
|---|---|
| Game of Ancient and Modern Days.—Its Protection andImportance.—The proper Shooting Seasons.—The Impolicyof using Batteries and Pivot-Guns. | [7] |
| [CHAPTER II.] | |
| Guns and Gunnery.—Breech-loaders compared with Muzzle-loaders.—ASharp Review of the “Dead Shot.”—TheField Trial. | [27] |
| [CHAPTER III.] | |
| Bay-snipe Shooting.—The Birds, their Habits, Peculiarities,and places of Resort.—Stools and Whistles.—Dress andImplements appropriate to their pursuit.—Their Namesand Mode of Capture. | [66] |
| [CHAPTER IV.] | |
| The New Jersey Coast.—Jersey Girls and their pleasantways.—The peculiarities of Bay-snipe further elucidated.—Mosquitoesrampant.—Good Shooting and “Fancy”Sport.—Shipwrecks and Ghosts. | [98] |
| [CHAPTER V.] | |
| Bay-Birds.—Particular Descriptions and Scientific Characteristics.—AComplete Account of each Variety. | [140] |
| [CHAPTER VI.] | |
| Montauk Point.—American Golden Plover or Frost-Bird.—ATrue Story of Three Thousand in a Flock.—Lester’sTavern.—Good Eating, Fine Fishing, and SplendidShooting.—The Nepeague Beach. | [178] |
| [CHAPTER VII.] | |
| Rail and Rail-Shooting.—Seasons, Localities, and Incidentsof Sport.—Use of Breech-loader or Muzzle-loader.—Equipment. | [190] |
| [CHAPTER VIII.] | |
| Wild-Fowl Shooting.—General Directions, from Boats,Blinds, or Batteries.—Retrievers from Baltimore andNewfoundland.—Western Sport.—Equipment. | [205] |
| [CHAPTER IX.] | |
| Duck-Shooting on the Inland Lakes.—The Club House.—PracticalViews of Practical Men.—Moral Tales.—ADay’s Fishing.—The Closing Scenes. | [219] |
| [CHAPTER X.] | |
| Suggestions to Sportsmen.—A Definition of the Term.—CrackShots.—The Art of Shooting.—The Art of notShooting. | [271] |
| [CHAPTER XI.] | |
| Trap-Shooting.—Its Justification.—The Assistants.—Rulesand Regulations.—Care of Birds.—Tricks of theTrade. | [288] |
| [APPENDIX.] | |
| Ornithological Descriptions of the Geese and Ducks, withRemarks and Suggestions on their Habits.—Rules ofTrap-shooting. | [303] |
THE GAME BIRDS OF THE NORTH.
CHAPTER I.
GAME AND ITS PROTECTION.
By the ancient law of 1 and 2 William IV., chap. 32, under the designation of game, were included “hares, pheasants, partridges, grouse, heath or moor game, black game, and bustards.”
Hunting and hawking date back to the earliest days of knight-errantry, when parties of cavaliers and ladies fair, mounted on their mettlesome steeds caparisoned with all the skill of the cunning artificers of those days, pursued certain birds of the air with the falcon, and followed the royal stag through the well preserved and extensive forests with packs of hounds. The term game, therefore, had an early significance and positive application, but was confined to the creatures pursued in one or the other of these two modes.
The gun was first used for the shooting of feathered game in the early part of the eighteenth century; it soon became the favorite implement of the sportsman, and was brought into use, not only against the birds, but the beasts, of game. The huntsman no longer depends upon his brave dog and cloth-yard shaft, but upon his own powers of endurance and of marksmanship. Instead of watching the savage falcon strike his prey far up in the heavens, he follows his high-bred setters, till their wonderful natural instinct betrays to him the presence of the game.
Where he once rode after the yelping pack, sounding the merry notes of his bugle horn, he now climbs and crawls laboriously, until he brings the wary stag within range of the deadly rifle. No more brilliant parties of lovely dames and gallant men, chatting merrily on the incidents of the day, ride gaily decked steeds; no more the luxury of the beautiful faces and pleasant companionship of the gentler sex is to be enjoyed; the ladies of modern times—except in England, where they occasionally follow foxes, which are rather vermin than game—preferring the excitement of ball-room flirtations to outdoor sports and pleasures, take no part in the pursuits of the chase.
Together with the change in the mode of capturing game, comes a necessity for a change in its former restricted meaning. Who would think of not including among game birds, the gamest of them all—the magnificent woodcock; nor the stylish English snipe, nor even possibly the brave little quail—unless he can be scientifically proved to be a partridge—which is at least doubtful! Migratory birds were not included in the sacred list, and the quail in England, as the woodcock and snipe of both England and America, are migratory, although the mere temporary character of their residence does not, in our view, at all alter the nature of their claims. The larger European woodcock is by no means so delicious or highly flavored a bird as our yellow-breasted, round-eyed beauty, and is much scarcer; while the foreign quail, on the other hand, is smaller than ours, and in southern Europe is found in vast flocks; but both are entitled to high rank among modern sportsmen.
The term Game Birds, therefore, should be, and has been by general consent, greatly extended in its application, and applied to all the numerous species which, whether migratory or not, are killed not alone for the market, but for sport; and which are followed on the stubble fields, in brown November, with the strong-limbed and keen-nosed setter, or shot from blind in scorching August; slain from battery in freezing December, or chased in a boat, or misled by decoys. All wild birds that furnish sport as well as profit are therefore game; and the gentle dowitchers along our sea-coast, lured to the deceitful stools, are as much entitled to the name as the stately ruffed grouse of our wild woods, or the royal turkey of the far west.