SHOOTING
To anyone who is fond of shooting, certain parts of China offer a
veritable paradise. When I say shooting I do not mean the kind of
sport to which one is accustomed at home, where to trespass a few
yards on the grounds of another man will probably result in legal
proceedings, where keepers flourish and wax fat on contributions
levied on the friends of mine host, where hand-raised game is driven
into the jaws of death, and where the sportsman's friend and delight,
his dog, is practically banished. No, I mean where one can look on the
whole empire of China and say, "Here is my ground, here I can take my
gun and my dogs and go just wherever, and do whatever, I please,
without let or hindrance; shoot what I will, stay as long as I like
without asking anyone's leave, and where keepers and game licences are
unknown."
Throughout China, pheasants, deer, quail, wildfowl and snipe abound,
but woodcock, partridges and hares are less numerous and less evenly
distributed. Bustards, plover and many other migratory birds appear
only in winter, while for hunters of big game, tigers, leopards,
horned deer and wild boar are found in certain localities.
Northern China offers the best opportunities, and while from Mongolia
to Ningpo game is plentiful enough, the mighty River Yangtse is _par
excellence_ the sportsman's elysium. Of course, one must have good
dogs and know the country, or go with someone who does, otherwise the
most ardent spirit would soon be cooled to freezing point and disgust
instead of delight would be the result of his endeavours. Along the
banks of this noble river, from the sea for hundreds of miles into the
interior, I have enjoyed as good sport as lies within reach of only
the very rich in western countries.
The Chinese are not often sportsmen, and away from foreign influence
but rarely molest wild animals of any kind.
Owing, however, to the increasing European colony at Shanghai and the
numerous mail steamers which daily arrive there, a profitable market
for game has sprung up during the past few years, to supply which
there are now a number of native gunners who, as a means of
livelihood, scour the country with foreign breech-loaders in search of
pheasants, wildfowl, etc., so that, being capital shots, within a
considerable distance of this port the shooting is not so good as
formerly, although in all other parts of the Empire it still remains
practically untouched until the advent of Europeans.
That there are not more aboriginal sportsmen is partly due to a law
which forbids the people to possess firearms, though this law has not
been rigidly enforced, and partly due to the primitive construction
and consequent unreliability of the few native fowling-pieces which do
exist.
Well away from beaten tracks I have occasionally met local sports
carrying guns together with slow-matches of smouldering brown paper.
They are remarkable weapons, with single iron barrels some four feet
and a half long, about twenty bore and without stocks, but having
pistol handles. There are no locks or springs, the hammer and trigger
being in one piece, working through the handle on a rivet. The hammers
have slits in them as if to hold flints, but which really are intended
for the slow-match. Sometimes these men had good bags of snipe, but
only once have I seen such a gun fired, which was at a pigeon sitting
about fifteen yards high in a tree. The gunner blew his slow-match
into a glow and pressed it into the slit in the hammer, placed the
pistol handle to his hip and pulled the trigger, which brought the
hammer slowly forward until the slow-match rested on the powder in the
pan, when the gun went off and the pigeon fell dead. Whether birds
are shot on the wing with these guns I cannot say, but remembering
that a hundred and fifty years ago it was accounted an extraordinary
thing to attempt flying shots even in this country, I should think
probably not.
Old muzzle-loading rifles of European make, striking either flints or
percussion caps, are also in occasional use as shot-guns, in
preference to native weapons.
The shot are always of iron, which is far cheaper than lead, and
extremely liable to cause great injury to the teeth, while the powder
is very poor, burning slowly with much smoke and smell. No cut wads
are used, but pieces of paper, rammed home with a rod, which instead
of being carried attached to the gun is held in the hand together with
the slow-match.
These same sports catch snipe in long, light nets which they carry
stretched out horizontally some two feet above the grass, so that a
bird on rising as it passes overhead, flies into it and is at once
secured. Snares of wire and string, ingenious traps of bamboo which
impale the birds on wooden spikes, and wicker traps closely resembling
the straw plaiting on bottles of olive oil, I have seen set for snipe
and quail in various places.
I once travelled from Shanghai to Nanking with an aged French Jesuit
priest and a Chinese official then returning from the Black Dragon or
Amour river. The former told me that, shortly after the Taiping
rebellion, pheasants were so numerous and tame in the devastated
fields around Nanking that natives speared them in the grass; while
the official said that in the almost deserted Black Dragon river
district these birds were so little afraid of man that on his approach
they would conceal only their heads in the grass, when it was possible
to capture them by the tail with the hand. Although personally unable
to guarantee either of these accounts, still, judging from the manner
in which they were narrated, I am inclined to believe both.
The first essential for shooting-trips up the Yangtse is a good
house-boat or light draft yacht of from ten to fifteen tons, into
which you pack every requisite, and which is in reality your floating
shooting-box for the time being. You have only to choose your field of
operations, sail there, and enjoy yourself to your heart's content in
luxury, fine bracing air, grand scenery and jovial company. What can
one wish for more!
Having decided on a trip you tell your boy in the morning that you
will leave that afternoon for so many days, and at the appointed time
step on board to find everything in readiness--guns, dogs, provisions,
and a good fire in the saloon. You give the lowdah his orders, and in
less than a minute are under way. All bother is at an end and you
make yourself comfortable, have afternoon tea, read, smoke, dine, chat
with your friend over the fire, and after spending the evening as
comfortably as if in your own house, retire to rest, awaking next
morning to find yourself on the scene of action and very possibly to
hear the pheasants crow while still in bed. A good beefsteak breakfast
and you are ready for the fray. After your day's sport you come back
to a hot bath and the comfort of a cosy cabin. Should you desire to
try fresh ground on the morrow, the lowdah will get the boat there,
either by sailing or tracking during the night, while you are enjoying
your well-earned sleep.
[Illustration: HOUSE-BOAT ON THE YANGTSE.
_To face page 50._]
Pheasants afford the principal sport and are identical with the
white-ringed English birds, only, if any thing, bigger, stronger in
flight and much more wily.
A hundred miles up the Yangtse and then along the Grand Canal, in
districts that were overrun by Taiping rebels, fine sport with
pointers may be had over what were formerly cultivated fields but are
now still lying waste, with here and there the ruins of a village
destroyed forty years ago, the inhabitants of which were either
extirpated, dragged off in the rebel army or fled to other parts of
the country. These abandoned fields, interspersed with ridges of low
hills clad with young pines, are generally dry and covered with fine
grass, in which the pheasants are fond of lying, and on a bright,
frosty morning it is truly delightful to walk across such country with
a couple of good pointers, watch your dogs work and bowl over the
birds as they rise.
At other places higher up river the low hills are covered with
acorn-bearing oak scrub, a favourite cover both for pheasants, which
feed on the acorns, as well as deer. This scrub, although very trying
to walk through, is not high enough to prevent pointers working
freely, and many a good bag have I made there.
Along the banks of the lower Yangtse, and on numerous islands in the
stream, are dense reeds, which, being flooded to a depth of several
feet in summer, grow from fifteen to twenty feet high, as thick as a
man's thumb, and almost as strong as bamboos. In these impenetrable
thickets, left dry as the waters fall in autumn, the pheasants
congregate in great numbers, but it is not till late winter, when the
reeds have been mostly cut for fuel, that it is possible to get them
out. About the end of December the reeds still uncut, stand in square,
even patches, the sides of which tower up like the walls of a house.
The best way is to select clumps of medium size, place a gun on either
side to keep well in advance, and turn two or three dogs, spaniels for
choice, in at one end. As these dogs hunt the reeds all the way down,
the pheasants will creep to the very edges, watch their opportunity,
and be off like cannon balls. Then is the time for a quick eye and
steady hand, but as you have probably been running to keep up with the
dogs, they are by no means the easy shots that one might imagine, and
many a time the "dead certainty" has slipped gaily away.
Other denizens of these swamps are woodcock, snipe, deer, and
occasionally racoons and wild cats, which follow the pheasants, so
that a mixed bag is frequently the product of a successful day, when
twenty-five head, including seven or eight brace of pheasants, would
represent a fair average per gun. With the exception of spring snipe,
enormous totals like those we gloat over in England are but rarely
made. It is the absolute freedom which is so charming, the hard work,
the bright atmosphere, the thick cover, and the excitement of
following the dogs.
Wildfowl of every description swarm during the spring and autumn
migrations, for after nesting on the Siberian steppes they go down to
the Sunny South in winter. Swan, geese, mallard, teal and countless
varieties of duck literally cover the waters of the Yangtse for miles
at a stretch, and will hardly rise to avoid the river-steamers as they
pass, although extremely shy of approaching small boats, while every
little pond or creek affords the probability of a shot.
Wildfowl-shooting, however, is not largely gone in for, why, I can
hardly say, unless it is that they are so superabundant as to make
them seem hardly worth the powder and shot, that the distances to go
for them are too great and the work of stalking too cold and tiresome,
or that other kinds of shooting are more attractive.
Woodcock are often found in bamboo groves from which it is generally
hard to flush them, while the cover is so thick that it is impossible
to shoot until they come out, though be it only for an instant, when,
topping the bamboos, they alight again on the opposite side. I have
spent nearly an hour in killing a brace which, although I saw perhaps
twenty times, I had the greatest difficulty in getting a snap at. They
also frequent pine woods and heather on the hills, and are identical
in appearance with the woodcock found in England.
During a severe winter at Chinkiang, word was brought in by natives
that some children had been carried off by "dog-headed tigers," which
monsters, after making lengthy inquiries, we assumed to be wolves.
With a view to getting a shot at these brutes, a friend and I went out
overnight to the community bungalow, a distance of seven miles, and in
the morning ranged warily through the pines and over the snow-clad
hills, seeking for traces of the man-eaters, being joined towards noon
by the British Consul. Carrying my twelve-bore fowling-piece loaded
with a bullet in the right barrel and a charge of big shot in the
left, the latter being full-choke, I was passing along the side of a
steep hill at the foot of which, and some fifty feet below me, lay a
frozen stream, when my dog-coolie, pointing downwards, cried, "Look at
the fish!"
Beneath the clear ice, of perhaps a quarter of an inch in thickness, a
mass of fish was swimming with the current. Instinctively I fired the
left barrel at them, and was greatly surprised to behold a jet of
water, broken ice and fish shoot up two or three feet high from a hole
made by the shot. The dog-coolie rushed down and filled his cap with
our unexpected prey, which we subsequently found to number twenty-two,
varying from about two to four ounces in weight each. Concussion from
the blow on the ice had stunned many, but others were bleeding from
shot wounds.
After a fruitless search for the "dog-headed tigers" we walked back to
Chinkiang that evening.
The cold weather having brought wildfowl of all descriptions I was off
betimes next morning to some islands in the Yangtse, a few miles down
river. An hour's sailing with wind and stream brought me to the
desired spot, where I landed on the sandy beach, when my dog, glad to
escape from confinement on board, ran to the top of a high dyke, or
wall for preventing floods, some hundred yards distant, and put up
hundreds of wild geese which had been preening themselves in the sun
on the other side, where they had also found shelter from the cutting
wind. The mighty roar of wings was the first intimation I had of their
presence, and as they were well out of range, my dog came in for a
reminder that his place for the time being was close to heel. Had they
not been thus scared away I could have walked unobserved to within
five yards of them.
Following the beach a little above high-water mark, I presently came
to several small ponds surrounded with willows, out of the first of
which some teal rose in a close bunch, when firing into the brown I
knocked them all down except one, and that I accounted for with the
other barrel. Falling into the pond, some that were winged gave a good
deal of trouble by diving, but eventually they were all secured, being
eight in number. Several ducks were scared away by my shots, but I
here added half-a-dozen snipe to the bag.
Coming to some wide ditches choked with reeds and willows my dog put
out pheasant after pheasant, but as they generally got up on the
opposite side, where there was no gun, I only managed to secure seven,
besides two woodcock.
While eating my lunch of sandwiches under the lee of a reedstack, I
observed that numerous flights of wildfowl on passing from one branch
of the river to another crossed a low, marshy corner of the island, so
that presently I made my way there and crouched down amongst the
rushes behind a dyke, having a small lagoon immediately at my back.
Mallard, widgeon and many other kinds of fowl came over in such quick
succession that for two hours I was kept fully occupied, and it was
highly gratifying to hear a heavy splash in the lagoon after each
successful shot.
As soon as the light began to fail I ceased firing and retrieved my
birds, which numbered twenty-seven, including several varieties of
fish ducks with serrated bills and, as I have subsequently learnt
although then mistaking them for large divers, three goosanders. On my
way back to the house-boat I surprised and shot a goose which was
feeding close under the river bank, so that my total bag consisted of
fifty-one head, and I always look back on that day as one of the most
enjoyable I have ever spent.
The snipe-shooting cannot be surpassed anywhere in the world. In
spring, after spending the winter in rich southern climes, these
birds, following the returning warmth, slowly migrate to Siberia for
nesting. They pass through Central China during May, arriving almost
simultaneously, when for about three weeks one can have superb sport,
and then they depart as suddenly as they came. One day they will
swarm, and the next hardly a bird is to be seen.
Snipe-shooting at home one always associates with long boots, cold
water, mud and marshes. Spring snipe-shooting in China is of a totally
different kind.
Imagine a bright, warm day, with the sun almost too powerful, dry
meadows with fresh, green grass, and clover about six inches high,
fields of wheat and barley in ear and beans in flower, all Nature at
her best. You take your gun with a plentiful supply of cartridges, a
coolie to carry bottled beer and sandwiches and to pick up the birds,
and sally forth into the meadows and fields, dressed in an ordinary
light summer suit or flannels, terai hat and low shoes, with the
bottoms of your trousers tucked into your socks to keep out the
insects.
You have not gone far before one, two--half a dozen birds rise within
easy range, and perhaps you make a right and left. What birds they
are, too, fat as butter!--in fact, so fat and heavy that they often
rip quite open merely from the force of falling to the ground. In this
way you go on, firing until the gun becomes so hot that every now and
then you must wait to let the barrels cool. My best bag for one day
was forty-one and a half couples, but this has been doubled by sports
who have shot to make a record.
Autumn snipe, or spring snipe returned, on passing from Siberia to
winter in the south, are not usually in very good condition, owing
probably to the nature of the country from which they come, and
strangely enough they appear to be less numerous and do not arrive so
simultaneously as the spring birds, though remaining longer, many
staying on through the winter. These do not frequent the dry meadows
and fields, but belong to the long boots, mud and marsh category.
I have never seen but one jack snipe, though the painted variety is
fairly common.
In the neighbourhood of a creek seven miles below Hankow is to be had
the best spring snipe-shooting that I know of. One bright May morning,
in response to the invitation of an old friend, I joined him and two
other guests aboard his house-boat and sailed down the Yangtse to this
well-known spot. On landing I shouldered my bag, containing fifty
cartridges, and told my coolie to bring a new box of a hundred in the
game-bag.
The plan was to send the house-boat to a place three or four miles
further down river, where, after shooting through the fields, the guns
would meet for tiffin.
Just as the lowdah was casting off our host asked if he might put a
few bottles of beer into my game-bag as it was a warm and thirsty
morning; so, to make room, and thinking that the snipe had not yet
fully arrived, in which case the spare cartridges would not be
required, they were replaced on board. We had not, however, walked
many yards along the river bank before it became apparent that there
were any number of birds, and I already regretted having so few
cartridges with me. After crossing the creek in a crazy sampan the
party separated, each taking his own line of country. Presently a
tremendous fusillade commenced from all the others, and as the snipe
were rising around them continually and making for a large swamp to my
left, I concealed myself in some millet, where, the birds coming
before the wind directly over my head, I enjoyed for half an hour or
so some excellent shooting and made a number of very sporting shots.
I now started for the swamp, but ere reaching it passed through some
grass patches between fields of barley and beans. The birds here rose
by the dozen, and standing on the same spot, without advancing a yard,
I shot eight, which were all on the ground at one time. My gun became
so hot that it was necessary to open it to let the barrels cool, while
the cartridges were all gone in less than an hour, so that carrying my
now useless weapon and boiling with rage, I had to start in pursuit of
the house-boat, with the shots of the others ringing merrily all
round, the snipe rising at almost every step, and the coolie laden
with beer and dead birds lagging far behind.
I arrived on board simultaneously with a party of ladies, who, under
the aegis of my friend's wife, had come down by launch to join us at
tiffin; at the conclusion of which long and sumptuous repast it was
time to start back to Hankow rather than again attack the snipe.
However, two of us landed with our guns and walked hurriedly across
country towards a point about three miles up river, there to rejoin
the party on the boat. Of course we kept them waiting, the sport was
so good, but satisfaction at the total bag of some two hundred snipe
did much to smooth matters over. Indeed, the bag would have been still
larger except for the vile shooting of one gun; but as a few days
later his engagement to one of the ladies of the tiffin-party was
announced, the mystery was explained, and when in a few weeks the
wedding bells rang, we all forgave him.
Four or five miles outside the principal gate of Peking is the Nan
Hai-tzu, or Imperial Hunting Park, where a few years ago there were
herds of far-famed hybrids known as the "four unlikes," since they
possessed certain attributes of, I believe, the horse, the deer, the
ox and the sheep, without belonging definitely to either family.
Unfortunately, Europeans were not allowed to enter this preserve, so I
was unable personally to see these curiosities, although their
existence was well authenticated.
Outside the lofty wall enclosing this park is a kind of common
interspersed with marshland through which a small stream flows, and
there I have bagged as many as ten couple of snipe in an afternoon,
with an occasional wild duck.
Sending out the cart with gun, dog and provisions in charge of the
head mafoo at about eleven o'clock on Saturday morning, as soon as
work was over at one I would mount my pony, held in readiness by the
second mafoo, and gallop with him after the cart, to find tiffin
awaiting me spread on the grass.
In this way I was comfortably ready to shoot by half-past two, which
would allow of about two and a half hours' sport before returning.
On one of these occasions I saw several large flocks of sand grouse,
which, I believe, are native to Mongolia, but only once managed to get
within range, killing a brace. They are beautiful, gamey-looking
birds, of a very light brown or sand colour, mottled on the back and
with legs and feet thickly feathered. Their flight much resembles that
of golden plover, only sharper.
Having finished shooting, my gun was again placed in the cart and we
started leisurely for home, I riding a short distance in advance,
followed by the second mafoo, while my pointer rambled over the grass.
One evening, when thus returning, two medium-sized eagles swooped at
the dog and commenced to regularly hunt him, much to his
consternation. To dismount and get my gun out of its case again was
the work of a couple of minutes, when I shot one of the birds at a
distance of twenty yards, the other, instead of being alarmed,
immediately swooping at its fallen comrade, to meet with a similar
fate.
I could not get them stuffed, so had their wings and claws mounted as
fans, which I still have somewhere in my possession.
The common deer are small, from thirty to forty pounds in weight, and
without horns. They have a thick, bristly hide, and the buck has two
tusks of from two to four inches in length projecting downwards from
the upper jaw, with which he tears up the ground in search of roots,
and it is to these peculiarities that the name of "hog-deer" is due.
They mostly lie in the grass on forms, like hares, but sometimes in
thick scrub on the hillside, and can be knocked over at forty yards
with pheasant shot. I have bagged four in a day more than once. If
well cooked the venison is delicious.
Partridges are only found in certain districts. A few miles from
Chefoo excellent sport is to be had, but in Central China they are not
often seen, although they do exist, as I have shot one myself near
Ngankin. Down south the bamboo partridge abounds in places, but it is
a very different bird from the ordinary partridge, and takes its name
from the fact that it lives, moves and has its being in bamboo
coppices.
In the vicinity of Hongkong and Macao the partridge, although far from
numerous, is quite common, and a bag of three or four would represent
a good day's work. These birds resemble the red-legged variety so
common in England, but are considerably larger, while the plumage,
although practically identical in colour, is far more brilliant. A
curious feature about them is that they are never flushed in coveys
and very rarely in pairs, but are almost invariably single birds,
which fact, together with their large size and gorgeous plumage, leads
me to think that they must represent a distinct branch of the family,
to which the name "solitary" would be highly applicable.
Quail are numerous and in all respects resemble those found in this
country. They are chiefly prized by the Chinese for their pugilistic
qualities, for after being caught and having had their wings clipped
they are disposed of to various purchasers, who take them to miniature
cock-pits and there back them to fight the birds of other gamblers for
considerable sums, the combats being fierce and often deadly.
The hares are wretched little animals, all bones and felt, and not
larger than the English rabbit. They usually lie in the open, though
often found in graves and in holes in the rocks, from which I have
thought that they might be the "coney" mentioned in Scripture.
Bustards, or wild turkeys, are found at certain periods all over
China. They are very shy, always settle on wide plains, and are
extremely difficult of approach--a shot being only obtainable after
long and careful stalking.
Although tigers are occasionally to be found in most of the southern
provinces, there are but few places easily accessible to Europeans
where they exist in any number, and not having been in one of these
favoured spots I have had no opportunity to try my hand at this
exciting sport, but a friend of mine, who has earned considerable fame
at it, and who keeps a row of grinning tiger skulls on his
drawing-room mantelpiece as mementoes of successful hunts, described
to me how operations are conducted.
At Amoy, which is probably the best known of these districts, when
natives from the surrounding country bring word into the settlement
that a tiger has been seen, preparations for the hunt are quickly
completed, and a party of sportsmen repairs to the scene of action.
The country being exceedingly rocky, the tigers make their lairs in
caves and rocks, approached by long tunnels or holes just large enough
to admit the beasts, so that to get them out is both difficult and
dangerous.
Having traced spore to the entrance of one of these tunnels, my friend
crawled in first with his rifle, immediately after him coming a native
shikarri, who thrust forward over my friend's back a long bamboo
bearing at the end a lighted torch. Next followed three more
shikarries, holding long spears, which they similarly thrust in
advance, so that the attacking force consisted of a torch, three
spears, the Englishman with his rifle and four shikarries, in which
order they slowly crept along the passage, the sides of which were
worn smooth by continual friction of tigers passing to and fro, until
growls and snarls proclaimed that their quarry was near at hand.
Presently two green, shifting eyes could be distinguished a few feet
beyond the torch, when, carefully aimed between them, a hollow,
express bullet crashed through the monster's skull, killing him on the
spot.
What would happen in case the brute was only wounded and charged I
have never heard, but personally I should be somewhat chary in
trusting to the protection of a torch and three spears.
It is related that a practical old Yankee sport, desirous of slaying
his tiger, joined in one of these expeditions, setting out from the
rendezvous armed to the teeth, in company with another hunter, but
before very long came stepping briskly back, and by way of explanation
_guessed_ "the tiger's footprints were getting too durned fresh."
I consider he showed true American acumen.
Spear-grass one often hears of but seldom sees, and until making
acquaintance with the real thing I had always imagined that the barbed
grass seeds, which are such a harmful worry to dogs, were practically
identical with it. Not at all.
Before leaving Ichang for a trip to the Yangtse gorges I expressed my
intention of trying to get some of those beautiful Reeves pheasants,
having tails several feet in length, which are indigenous to that
locality, but was warned that it would be necessary to take long
leggings as a protection against spear-grass. Not having any with me,
and believing I knew what spear-grass was, I refrained from borrowing,
so that on landing at Nantou with my dog and gun, it was in an
ordinary shooting suit and worsted stockings.
Inquiries of natives as to the whereabouts of these birds soon led me
up the mountain-side to a rocky plateau, which looked extremely
likely, and where I even saw traces of them. My dog commenced to work,
and I followed him into the light, dry, crackling grass, but suddenly
became conscious of a smarting in the legs as though walking through
nettles, and noticed that the grass was adhering to my stockings.
However, I pushed on, my dog being hot on the scent, but presently we
both came to a standstill--I, because of cramp in both legs, each of
which was now enveloped in grass to the size of a bee-hive; while the
dog's shaggy coat had collected it till he appeared as large as a
sheep, and could no longer force his way along, besides being in much
pain.
It was a short half mile down hill to the boat but the difficulty and
discomfort of getting there were considerable. When at length the boy
proceeded to take my stockings off it was found that they were
practically sewn to my skin by the spear-grass, the tiny barbed points
of which had passed in hundreds through the wool and worked like
fish-hooks into my calves. Without penetrating deep enough to more
than slightly draw blood, they had one and all to be forcibly dragged
out as the stockings were peeled off. For days I was lame and sore,
while my dog lived in misery for weeks. I did not even see a Reeves
pheasant.
At Nantou I gathered delicious oranges from the tree for one cash
each, or, eight oranges for a farthing.
A twelve-bore is the best gun for use in China, from the fact that
cartridges are everywhere procurable, whereas for other sizes they
have frequently to be imported from home, although I must admit that
a twenty-bore is preferable for snipe-shooting in warm weather, owing
to the lightness of both gun and cartridges.
It seems to be the general opinion, with which I agree, that pointers
and spaniels are the most suitable dogs to keep, for they appear to
work the cover and to stand the climate better than other breeds.
As European dogs seldom live in China more than three or four years,
and often less, it is necessary to always have puppies coming on if
you do not want your shooting to be spoiled, for it is useless to try
and get pheasants out of the thick cover without them. Dysentery is a
very prevalent canine disease, but their most deadly enemy, and one
existing in no other country that I know of, is worms in the heart.
How the germs get into the blood no doctor has yet been able to say,
but thin, white worms resembling vermicelli cluster round the heart,
living on the blood, until they become so numerous as to eventually
choke an artery, when death is instantaneous. In the case of a
favourite dog, on which a doctor kindly performed a _post-mortem_
examination, these worms were in such numbers that I positively could
not see the heart at all.
Native dogs are useless for sport, as they seem to be devoid of that
friendly intelligence so noticeable in our own breeds, while their
powers of scent are much inferior. I have heard that in the island of
Hainan a certain breed exists which is very good for hunting leopards
and wild boar, but this I cannot guarantee.
In the winter of 1889 I was invited by a friend to join him in his
house-boat a few miles below Chinkiang, when we could shoot together
next day and then have Christmas dinner on board.
I hired a small sampan to sail me down, together with my boy, taking
only a bottle of whisky, a few things for tiffin and a plum cake, the
last being a Christmas gift from a Norwegian lady.
Starting at noon, it was about three o'clock and near the rendezvous,
when we sighted a flock of geese asleep in the sun on a mud-bank. I
ordered the sampan-man to get as near as possible, and when the geese
rose at a distance of about sixty yards, knocked down a couple with
two charges of S.S.G. A minute later another came flying overhead
calling to its wounded mate, and this also I dropped without pity. The
first two, being only winged, gave a lot of trouble, as they swam and
dived with great speed, but all three were eventually secured.
There was still an hour before dark, and seeing no signs of my friend
I went on shore and bagged three pheasants before returning to the
boat. Next morning, after passing a cold and miserable night in the
tiny cabin of the dirty little sampan, I started with gun and dog at
about eight o'clock--fully expecting that the house-boat would turn up
during my absence--and shot all day, killing eleven pheasants, two
deer, three woodcock, seven duck and one pigeon. As by dark there were
still no signs of my expected host I had no choice but to return home.
It was a lovely night, bright, frosty and star-light, with a nice,
crisp breeze, which, the river being there about two miles wide,
raised quite a sea. Thousands of wildfowl, all on their way south,
were flying, whistling and whirring about in every direction, and
rising from the water quite close to the boat. My dog "Snipe" and I
crept into the cabin out of the cutting wind, which was dead ahead,
and proceeded to discuss our impromptu Christmas fare, which, after
all, was not so bad, and reflected great credit on the boy's cooking
powers. I noted down the _menu_, and here it is:--
1. Pigeon Soup.
2. Woodcock.
3. Boiled Pheasant.
4. Cold Roast Beef.
5. Plum Cake ablaze with Whisky.
6. Cheese.
7. Pumelo.
Whisky and Water.
Tea.
There was no holly or mistletoe to remind one of Merrie England, but I
drank to "the Old Folks at Home" with the sadness peculiar to
wanderers on such occasions, and then gave myself up to nicotine and
reflection for the rest of the evening, arriving home at midnight to
find that my truant friend was ill in bed.