Page:The Hare.djvu/113

Rh In open ground, and especially large turnip fields where hares abound, it is often necessary to drive them to the guns in order to kill them. For the shooters the sport is not great, as it merely consists in being concealed behind a hedge and keeping very still till the hares come quietly up. But the keeper who is in charge of the proceedings has many matters to think of. He must outflank the hares so as to cut them off from covert. He must have his beaters sufficiently near together to prevent their walking over and past hares in their seats, and he must, above all, avoid going too fast, or making very much noise, or else the hares will inevitably sit very close and steal away behind his men. Chief essential of all, he must make his drives down wind, or the hares, travelling quietly forward, will both scent and hear the concealed sportsmen, just as deer would, and will break to right or left in the most provoking way, just out of shot of the guns, and too far off to be turned by the flanking beaters.

And here let me put in a word, addressed chiefly to the youthful sportsman, never to fire a long shot at a hare going straight away from him. It is but useless cruelty. I will suppose, in these days of weapons of precision and careful education, that all our young friends have learned to 'hold pretty