THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 923, 9 June 1877, Page 2

THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

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In one of Mr Whyte Melville's most charming books he commences a chapter by asking —" Who delights in levelling the deadly tubes?" If he were here —and I wish he were, that I might thank him for the many pleasant hours he has given me—l should say '•I do." I took a license before the Ist. How I raised two pound ten to pay a Government who allows no tick is no affair of yours; but I raised it in a manner that induces me to inform you that genius is of no account. There's no credit in being a literary cuss here, although literary work give? one many a chr.nce of being able to exhibit a punched head. As you don't pay by the line, 1 sec little good in making my preliminary linked sweetness longer drawn out than is absolutely necessary. Licences are now obtainable at the Custom House. The gentleman who issued them reminded one of Mr Smauker, who, you will doubtless remember, was an oflieiai the youthful Weller shocked so much by whistling in the street. Whistling is not allowed in the Custom House. Applicants for licences will do well to remember this, and escape the stern rebuke I got for disturbing the sanctity of a big empty room ; in which one gentlemanly clerk was breaking himself down by endeavoring to keep up the silence which I now learn is indispensable to an office of the kind. When you go out a shooting and pay two pound ten for that privilege, it's as well to let your 'friends and the public generally know it. Owing to circumstances orer which I have no control, I am unable to make myself notorious by allowing my name to appear as a large subscriber to public charities, but we all like to achieve celebrity in some form; and there are wpyse ways of doing it tban bj

advertising yourself as a shootist by walking down the street with a gun under your arm, and a cartridge bag slung around you. I rode. Previous to starting, a sporting writer of this metropolis came around, picked my horse to pieces, said my stirrups were too short; my martingale too long; that I looked like a tailor riding a horse for the first time, and that he hadn't seen anything more thoroughly illustrative of a real cockney sportsman since he left England fifteen years ago. And yet that man puts up to write about sporting things. He never even asked me to have a drink. I treated Ms remarks with the despisery they merited, also with some of those brilliant"' flashes of silence which are daily getting more and more familiar to me, when I have'no repartee on hand. I slept at Biecarton, at the house of a friend with whom I have amicable relation, and at half-past six next morning another friend called for me in a trap. It was a hard frost, and while our well matched and excellently appointed team of one (a good 'un though) was travelling up the road towards the Racecourse, I was reminded of Keats. I mean the poet. Now I think of it, what would journalists do without being reminded by their own context of quotations which are perfectly familiar even to Lord Macaulay's oft-quoted schoolboy. Keats remarks as follows in reference to St. Agnes' Eve : Ah! bitter chill it was. The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; The hare limped trembling, through the frozen grass; And drowsy was the flock in woolly fold. Keats must have been about in the cold some time to write like that. He died young. As we whirl up the Eiccarton road the rising sun casts purple tints athwart the white helmets of the distant hills, and with a little thought and trouble I might have vamped up a little diluted Euskin for you; but two white turkeys are roosting on a fence hard by, and my companion thinks of making sure that his eun has been properly charged. This little incident reminds me of a story from the Worth of a good minister, who recently became the owner of a turkey. He made up his mind to quit this bird, and accordingly sent it down to the village hostelrie to be raffled. Twelve members, one shilling each, and if it came off right the reverend putter-up was willing to spend a shilling. What a treasure this man would be with an innate talent like that for raffles at a bazaar. But this is not pheasant shooting. At the Eace-course we found three sportsmen waiting; the party thus numbered five ; but as Mr Cutts remarked that I couldn't shoot a flying haystack under the most favorable circumstances, it will perhaps be as well to make the number of guns consist of four. Mr A. Ward is answerable for the statement that a goak sometimes improves a comic paper. On this principle I fancy when a man writes on sporting subjects he should use phrases appropriate to the occasion ; and therefore when I say that we spun merrily down the road at a clinking pace I fancy I'm writing pretty well en regie. We got to our ground in good time, and declining from our host hospitable offers of breakfast (I had eaten two and my constitution is getting that beaten up that three is more than I can manage now) we started. We hf d four dogs. Snipe, the veteran setter, Grouse and Shot, two uncommonly nice pointers, and a puppy Mr Powell has in training. In the first stubble field Snipe worked slowly up to what was clearly a shot for some one. Keen as flies round a keg of molasses we purrounded the spot. The bird, a nice young cock, rose and flew away unhurt. Each thought the other was going to fire, and no one did. After a few minutes spent in a conversation which it's scarcely worth while repeating here, we resamed work, and my partner drew first blood quickly, followed by Cutts. I never have any luck on these occasions. I found mys<uf in the centre of a mob of hen pheasants, wnich rose, so to speak, in clouds around me. Had they been rooster birds, there would have been a scene of carnage on that stubble seldom if ever equalled in the annals of sport. We walked many many miles, the dogs working beautifully ; and the boys —self excepted—shooting well. I've studied shooting a good bit. Hero is a rule in reference to the wily long-tail:—

" When a pheasant rises be most particular. He vises nearly perpendicular. "Wait a few moments until your sight Perceives his horizontal flight." I act up to this carefully, but the results are not in proportion to my observance of the rule. I cither wait a few minutes too long, or else fail to perceive his horizontal flight. Cutts says as a shot I have many equals, and thinks many fortunes might be made by backing the bird whenever I fire. Be that as it may, we had twenty birds by ten o'clock : and when we halted the most popular man of the party was one who carried a flask. None of them ever drank out shooting they said, but the way they ran their lips over the rim of that old whiskey gourd was curious. We now took down a plain of tussock with indifferent results, and the longpause between the shots gave me time to admire the habits of the puppy, whose education was commencing. Probably a dog more obedient to the command " Down Charge " does not exist under the canopy of heaven. I took particular notice of this pup. He was yellow, and thoughtful, very very I am convinced that pup would lie and think for hours and hours, if no one interfered with him. Dogs differ from human beings who frequently think for hours and lie afterwards. Subsequently we shot a nice plantation where I killed a bird. The thoughtful pup flushed him under my feet, and a really grand shot with my second barrel dropped him in four pieces within ten yards of my feet. I subsequently killed, in a belt of timber, with a beautiful snap shot what must originally have been a really fine bird. I judge so from the remains of this well-built pheasant, killed stone dead, as Mr Gordon Gumming would have said, within seven feet of my gun. There's some pleasure in a neat shot like that. We now, as the bag was once more getting heavy, commenced to retrace our steps towards lunch. Crossing the tussocky plain we had shot over in the early part of the day we met the owner, who kindly said he woidd have allowed us to shoot over it had the party been smaller; but we were more, he said, like a regiment of soldiers than anything else. I was never taken for a soldier—not even for a volunteer — fore, but I forgive the insult for the sake oi the kindly feeling of the gentleman. Mi Hepworth, our host, now produced lunch. None of the party ever ate lunch they said, but they violcnced their usual habits and went for it in a style I have seldom ever seen exceeded. The afternoon shooting was not good. We had good ground and good dogs, but the birds were away calling on friends. We could hear around the distant and random gun some sports were frequently firing, bul our shots were few and far between, and 1 was just getting my Jjand in, Wo didn't do

so badly after all. Sixteen brace in the bag, Ted Cutts and Sam Powell being answerable for the greater part. Thirty-three birds cleanly missed by myself. A lovely day. Good sport in the morning, and dogs which to see work is a real pleasure. I hope to have some more day alike it before the season is over; and though a paper like this is not the place forwhat Mr Puff would call the puff collateral, I can recommend any one who has a good dog he wants well broken to send him to Sam Powell, who is certainly the best of tutors. It may be interesting to some of your readers to know that the hen pheasants seem far in excess of the cocks, and that from what I can see, an amended Game Act is a lot required. On a future occasion I'll tell you why, but for the present the pressure on your space will of course preclude my going into particulars.