Much as I had heard of Tom Draw, I was I must confess, taken altogether
aback when I, for the first time, set eyes upon him. I had heard Harry
Archer talk of him fifty times as a crack shot; as a top sawyer at a
long day's fag; as the man of all others he would choose as his mate, if
he were to shoot a match, two against two--what then was my astonishment
at beholding this worthy, as he reared himself slowly from his recumbent
position? It is true, I had heard his sobriquet, "Fat Tom," but, Heaven
and Earth! such a mass of beef and brandy as stood before me, I had
never even dreamt of. About five feet six inches at the very utmost in
the perpendicular, by six or--"by'r lady"--nearer seven in
circumference, weighing, at the least computation, two hundred and fifty
pounds, with a broad jolly face, its every feature--well-formed and
handsome, rather than otherwise--mantling with an expression of the most
perfect excellence of heart and temper, and overshadowed by a vast mass
of brown hair, sprinkled pretty well with gray!--Down he plumped from
the counter with a thud that made the whole floor shake, and with a hand
outstretched, that might have done for a Goliah, out he strode to meet
us.
"Why, hulloa! hulloa! Mr. Archer," shaking his hand till I thought he
would have dragged the arm clean out of the socket--"How be you, boy?
How be you?" "Right well, Tom, can't you see? Why confound you, you've
grown twenty pound heavier since July!--but here, I'm losing all my
manners!--this is Frank Forester, whom you have heard me talk about so
often! He dropped down here out of the moon, Tom, I believe! at least I
thought about as much of seeing the man in the moon, as of meeting him
in this wooden country--but here he is, as you see, come all the way to
take a look at the natives. And so, you see, as you're about the
greatest curiosity I know of in these parts, I brought him straight up
here to take a peep! Look at him, Frank--look at him well! Now, did you
ever see, in all your life, so extraordinary an old devil?--and yet,
Frank, which no man could possibly believe, the old fat animal has some
good points about him--he can walk some! shoot, as he says, first best!
and drink--good Lord, how he can drink!"
"And that reminds me," exclaimed Tom, who with a ludicrous mixture of
pleasure, bashfulness, and mock anger, had been listening to what he
evidently deemed a high encomium; "that we hav'nt drinked yet; have you
quit drink, Archer, since I was to York? What'll you take, Mr. Forester?
Gin? yes, I have got some prime gin! You never sent me up them groceries
though, Archer; well, then, here's luck! What, Yorkshire, is that you? I
should ha' thought now, Archer, you'd have cleared that lazy Injun out
afore this time!"
"Whoy, measter Draa--what 'na loike's that kind o' talk? coom coom now,
where'll Ay tak t' things tull?"
"Put Mr. Forester's box in the bed-room off the parlor--mine up stairs,
as usual," cried Archer. "Look sharp and get the traps out. Now, Tom, I
suppose you have got no supper for us?"
"Cooper, Cooper! you snooping little devil," yelled Tom, addressing his
second hope, a fine dark-eyed, bright-looking lad of ten or twelve
years; "Don't you see Mr. Archer's come?--away with you and light the
parlor fire, look smart now, or I'll cure you! Supper--you're always
eat! eat! eat! or, drink! drink!--drunk! Yes! supper; we've got pork!
and chickens..."
"Oh! d--n your pork," said I, "salt as the ocean I suppose!"
"And double d--n your chickens," chimed in Harry, "old superannuated
cocks which must be caught now, and then beheaded, and then soused into
hot water to fetch off the feathers; and save you lazy devils the
trouble of picking them. No, no, Tom! get us some fresh meat for
to-morrow; and for to-night let us have some hot potatoes, and some bread
and butter, and we'll find beef; eh, Frank? and now look sharp, for we
must be up in good time tomorrow, and, to be so, we must to bed betimes.
And now, Tom, are there any cock?"
"Cock! yes, I guess there be, and quail, too, pretty plenty! quite a
smart chance of them, and not a shot fired among them this fall, any
how!"
"Well, which way must we beat to-morrow? I calculate to shoot three days
with you here; and, on Wednesday night, when we get in, to hitch up and
drive into Sullivan, and see if we can't get a deer or two! You'll go,
Tom?"
"Well, well, we'll see any how; but for to-morrow, why, I guess we must
beat the 'Squire's swamp-hole first; there's ten or twelve cock there, I
know; I see them there myself last Sunday; and then acrost them
buck-wheat stubbles, and the big bog meadow, there's a drove of quail
there; two or three bevys got in one, I reckon; leastwise I counted
thirty-three last Friday was a week; and through Seer's big swamp, over
to the great spring!"
"How is Seer's swamp? too wet, I fancy," Archer interposed, "at least I
noticed, from the mountain, that all the leaves were changed in it, and
that the maples were quite bare."
"Pretty fair, pretty fair, I guess," replied stout Tom, "I harnt been
there myself though, but Jem was down with the hounds arter an old fox
t'other day, and sure enough he said the cock kept flopping up quite
thick afore him; but then the critter will lie, Harry; he will lie like
thunder, you know; but somehow I concaits there be cock there too; and
then, as I was saying, we'll stop at the great spring and get a bite of
summat, and then beat Hellhole; you'll have sport there for sartin! What
dogs have you got with you, Harry?"
"Your old friends, Shot and Chase, and a couple of spaniels for thick
covert!"
"Now, gentlemen, your suppers are all ready."
"Come, Tom," cried Archer; "you must take a bite with us--Tim, bring us
in three bottles of champagne, and lots of ice, do you hear?"
And the next moment we found ourselves installed in a snug parlor,
decorated with a dozen sporting prints, a blazing hickory fire snapping
and spluttering and roaring in a huge Franklin stove; our luggage safely
stowed in various corners, and Archer's double gun-case propped on two
chairs below the window.
An old-fashioned round table, covered with clean white linen of domestic
manufacture, displayed the noble round of beef which we had brought up
with us, flanked by a platter of magnificent potatoes, pouring forth
volumes of dense steam through the cracks in their dusky skins; a lordly
dish of butter, that might have pleased the appetite of Sisera; while
eggs and ham, and pies of apple, mince-meat, cranberry, and custard,
occupied every vacant space, save where two ponderous pitchers, mantling
with ale and cider, and two respectable square bottles, labelled "Old
Rum" and "Brandy-1817," relieved the prospect. Before we had sat down,
Timothy entered, bearing a horse bucket filled to the brim with ice,
from whence protruded the long necks and split corks of three champagne
bottles.
"Now, Tim," said Archer, "get your own supper, when you've finished with
the cattle; feed the dogs well to-night; and then to bed. And hark you,
call me at five in the morning; we shall want you to carry the game-bag
and the drinkables; take care of yourself, Tim, and good night!"
"No need to tell him that," cried Tom, "he's something like yourself; I
tell you, Archer, if Tim ever dies of thirst, it must be where there is
nothing wet, but water!"
"Now hark to the old scoundrel, Frank," said Archer, "hark to him pray,
and if he doesn't out-eat both of us, and out-drink anything you ever
saw, may I miss my first bird to-morrow--that's all! Give me a slice of
beef, Frank; that old Goth would cut it an inch thick, if I let him
touch it; out with a cork, Tom! Here's to our sport to-morrow!"
"Uh; that goes good!" replied Tom, with an oath, which, by the apparent
gusto of the speaker, seemed to betoken that the wine had tickled his
palate--"that goes good! that's different from the darned red trash you
left up here last time."
"And of which you have left none, I'll be bound," answered Archer,
laughing; "my best Latour, Frank, which the old infidel calls trash."
"It's all below, every bottle of it," answered Tom: "I wouldn't use such
rot-gut stuff, no, not for vinegar. 'Taint half so good as that red
sherry you had up here oncet; that was poor weak stuff, too, but it did
well to make milk punch of; it did well instead of milk."
"Now, Frank," said Archer, "you won't believe me, that I know; but it's
true, all the same. A year ago, this autumn, I brought up five gallons
of exceedingly stout, rather fiery, young brown sherry--draught wine,
you know!--and what did Tom do here, but mix it, half and half, with
brandy, nutmeg, and sugar, and drink it for milk punch!"
"I did so, by the eternal," replied Tom, bolting a huge lump of beef, in
order to enable himself to answer--"I did so, and good milk punch it
made, too, but it was too weak! Come, Mr. Forester, we harn't drinked
yet, and I'm kind o' gittin dry!"
And now the mirth waxed fast and furious--the champagne speedily was
finished, the supper things cleared off, hot water and Starke's
Ferintosh succeeded, cheroots were lighted, we drew closer in about the
fire, and, during the circulation of two tumblers--for to this did Harry
limit us, having the prospect of unsteady hands and aching heads before
him for the morrow--never did I hear more genuine and real humor, than
went round our merry trio.
Tom Draw, especially, though all his jokes were not such altogether as I
can venture to insert in my chaste paragraphs, and though at times his
oaths were too extravagantly rich to brook repetition, shone forth
resplendent. No longer did I wonder at what I had before deemed Harry
Archer's strange hallucination; Tom Draw is a decided genius--rough as a
pine knot in his native woods--but full of mirth, of shrewdness, of keen
mother wit, of hard horse sense, and last, not least, of the most
genuine milk of human kindness. He is a rough block; but, as Harry says,
there is solid timber under the uncouth bark enough to make five hundred
men, as men go now-a-days in cities!
At ten o'clock, thanks to the excellent precautions of my friend Harry,
we were all snugly berthed, before the whiskey, which had well justified
the high praise I had heard lavished on it, had made any serious
inroads on our understanding, but not before we had laid in a quantum to
ensure a good night's rest.
Bright and early was I on foot the next day, but before I had half
dressed myself I was assured, by the clatter of the breakfast things,
that Archer had again stolen a march upon me; and the next moment my
bed-room door, driven open by the thick boot of that worthy, gave me a
full view of his person--arrayed in a stout fustian jacket--with half a
dozen pockets in full view, and Heaven only knows how many more lying
perdu in the broad skirts. Knee-breeches of the same material, with
laced half-boots and leather leggins, set off his stout calf and well
turned ankle.
"Up! up! Frank," he exclaimed, "it is a morning of ten thousand; there
has been quite a heavy dew, and by the time we are afoot it will be well
evaporated; and then the scent will lie, I promise you! make haste, I
tell you, breakfast is ready!"
Stimulated by his hurrying voice, I soon completed my toilet, and
entering the parlor found Harry busily employed in stirring to and fro a
pound of powder on one heated dinner plate, while a second was
undergoing the process of preparation on the hearthstone under a glowing
pile of hickory ashes.
At the side-table, covered with guns, dog-whips, nipple-wrenches, and
the like, Tim, rigged like his master, in half boots and leggins, but
with a short roundabout of velveteen, in place of the full-skirted
jacket, was filling our shot-pouches by aid of a capacious funnel, more
used, as its odor betokened, to facilitate the passage of gin or Jamaica
spirits than of so sober a material as cold lead.
At the same moment entered mine host, togged for the field in a huge
pair of cow-hide boots, reaching almost to the knee, into the tops of
which were tucked the lower ends of a pair of trowsers, containing yards
enough of buffalo-cloth to have eked out the main-sail of a North River
sloop; a waistcoat and single-breasted jacket of the same material, with
a fur cap, completed his attire; but in his hand he bore a large
decanter filled with a pale yellowish liquor, embalming a dense mass of
fine and worm-like threads, not very different in appearance from the
best vermicelli.
"Come, boys, come--here's your bitters," he exclaimed; and, as if to set
the example, filled a big tumbler to the brim, gulped it down as if it
had been water, smacked his lips, and incontinently tendered it to
Archer, who, to my great amazement, filled himself likewise a more
moderate draught, and quaffed it without hesitation.
"That's good, Tom," he said, pausing after the first sip; "that's the
best I ever tasted here; how old's that?"
"Five years!" Tom replied: "five years last fall! Daddy Tom made it out
my own best apples--take a horn, Mr. Forester," he added, turning to me
--"it's first best cider sperrits--better a darned sight than that Scotch
stuff you make such an etarnal fuss about, toting it up here every time,
as if we'd nothing fit to drink in the country!"
And to my sorrow I did taste it--old apple whiskey, with Lord knows how
much snake-root soaked in it for five years! They may talk about gall
being bitter; but, by all that's wonderful, there was enough of the
amari aliquid in this fonte, to me by no means of leporum, to have given
an extra touch of bitterness to all the gall beneath the canopy; and
with my mouth puckered up, till it was like anything on earth but a
mouth, I set the glass down on the table; and for the next five minutes
could do nothing but shake my head to and fro like a Chinese mandarin,
amidst the loud and prolonged roars of laughter that burst like thunder
claps from the huge jaws of Thomas Draw, and the subdued and half
respectful cachinnations of Tim Matlock.
By the time I had got a little better, the black tea was ready, and with
thick cream, hot buckwheat cakes, beautiful honey, and--as a stand by--
the still venerable round, we made out a very tolerable meal.
This done, with due deliberation Archer supplied his several pockets
with their accustomed load--the clean-punched wads in this--in that the
Westley Richards' caps--here a pound horn of powder--there a shot-pouch
on Syke's lever principle, with double mouth-piece--in another,
screw-driver, nipple-wrench, and the spare cones; and, to make up the tale,
dog-whip, dram-bottle, and silk handkerchief in the sixth and last.
"Nothing like method in this world," said Harry, clapping his
low-crowned broad-brimmed mohair cap upon his head; "take my word for it.
Now, Tim, what have you got in the bag?"
"A bottle of champagne, sur," answered Tim, who was now employed
slinging a huge fustian game-bag, with a net-work front, over his right
shoulder, to counterbalance two full shot-belts which were already
thrown across the other--"a bottle of champagne, sur--a cold roast
chicken--t' Cheshire cheese--and t' pilot biscuits. Is your dram-bottle
filled wi' t' whiskey, please sur?"
"Aye, aye, Tim. Now let loose the dogs--carry a pair of couples and a
leash along with you; and mind you, gentlemen, Tim carries shot for all
hands; and luncheon--but each one finds his own powder, caps, &c.; and
any one who wants a dram, carries his own--the devil a-one of you gets a
sup out of my bottle, or a charge out of my flask! That's right, old
Trojan, isn't it?" with a good slap on Tom's broad shoulder.
"Shot! Shot--why Shot! don't you know me, old dog?" cried Tom, as the
two setters bounded into the room, joyful at their release--"good dog!
good Chase!" feeding them with great lumps of beef.
"Avast! there Tom--have done with that," cried Harry; "you'll have the
dogs so full that they can't run."
"Why, how'd you like to hunt all day without your breakfast--hey?"
"Here, lads! here, lads! wh-e-ew!" and followed by his setters, with his
gun under his arm, away went Harry; and catching up our pieces likewise,
we followed, nothing loth, Tim bringing up the rear with the two
spaniels fretting in their couples, and a huge black thorn cudgel, which
he had brought, as he informed me, "all t' way from bonny Cawoods."
It was as beautiful a morning as ever lighted sportsmen to their labors.
The dew, exhaled already from the long grass, still glittered here and
there upon the shrubs and trees, though a soft fresh south-western
breeze was shaking it thence momently in bright and rustling showers;
the sun, but newly risen, and as yet partially enveloped in the thin
gauze-like mists so frequent at that season, was casting shadows,
seemingly endless, from every object that intercepted his low rays, and
chequering the whole landscape with that play of light and shade, which
is the loveliest accessory to a lovely scene; and lovely was the scene,
indeed, as e'er was looked upon by painter's or by poet's eye--how then
should humble prose do justice to it?
Seated upon the first slope of a gentle hill, midway of the great valley
heretofore described, the village looked due south, toward the chains of
mountains, which we had crossed on the preceding evening, and which in
that direction bounded the landscape. These ridges, cultivated half-way
up their swelling sides, which lay mapped out before our eyes in all the
various beauty of orchards, yellow stubbles, and rich pastures dotted
with sleek and comely cattle, were rendered yet more lovely and
romantic, by here and there a woody gorge, or rocky chasm, channeling
their smooth flanks, and carrying down their tributary rills, to swell
the main stream at their base. Toward these we took our way by the same
road which we had followed in an opposite direction on the previous
night--but for a short space only--for having crossed the stream, by the
same bridge which we had passed on entering the village, Tom Draw pulled
down a set of bars to the left, and strode out manfully into the
stubble.
"Hold up, good lads!--whe-ew--whewt!" and away went the setters through
the moist stubble, heads up and sterns down, like fox-hounds on a
breast-high scent, yet under the most perfect discipline; for at the
very first note of Harry's whistle, even when racing at the top of their
pace, they would turn simultaneously, alter their course, cross each
other at right angles, and quarter the whole field, leaving no foot of
ground unbeaten.
No game, however, in this instance, rewarded their exertions; and on we
went across a meadow, and two other stubbles, with the like result. But
now we crossed a gentle hill, and, at its base, came on a level tract,
containing at the most ten acres of marsh land, overgrown with high
coarse grass and flags. Beyond this, on the right, was a steep rocky
hillock, covered with tall and thrifty timber of some thirty years'
growth, but wholly free from under-wood. Along the left-hand fence ran a
thick belt of underwood, sumac and birch, with a few young oak trees
interspersed; but in the middle of the swampy level, covering at most
some five or six acres, was a dense circular thicket composed of every
sort of thorny bush and shrub, matted with cat-briers and wild vines,
and overshadowed by a clump of tall and leafy ashes, which had not as
yet lost one atom of their foliage, although the underwood beneath them
was quite sere and leafless.
"Now then," cried Harry, "this is the 'Squire's swamp-hole!' Now for a
dozen cock! hey, Tom? Here, couple up the setters, Tim; and let the
spaniels loose. Now Flash! now Dan! down charge, you little villains!"
and the well broke brutes dropped on the instant. "How must we beat this
cursed hole?"
"You must go through the very thick of it, consarn you!" exclaimed Tom;
"at your old work already, hey? trying to shirk at first!"
"Don't swear so! you old reprobate! I know my place, depend on it,"
cried Archer; "but what to do with the rest of you!--there's the rub!"
"Not a bit of it," cried Tom--"here, Yorkshire--Ducklegs--here, what's
your name--get away you with those big dogs--atwixt the swamp-hole, and
the brush there by the fence, and look out that you mark every bird to
an inch! You, Mr. Forester, go in there, under that butter-nut; you'll
find a blind track there, right through the brush--keep that 'twixt Tim
and Mr. Archer; and keep your eyes skinned, do! there'll be a cock up
before you're ten yards in. Archer, you'll go right through, and I'll..."
"You'll keep well forward on the right--and mind that no bird crosses to
the hill; we never get them, if they once get over. All right! In with
you now! Steady, Flash! steady! hie up, Dan!" and in a moment Harry was
out of sight among the brush-wood, though his progress might be traced
by the continual crackling of the thick underwood.
Scarce had I passed the butter-nut, when, even as Torn had said, up
flapped a woodcock scarcely ten yards before me, in the open path, and
rising heavily to clear the branches of a tall thorn bush, showed me his
full black eye, and tawny breast, as fair a shot as could be fancied.
"Mark!" holloaed Harry to my right, his quick ear having caught the flap
of the bird's wing, as he rose. "Mark cock--Frank!"
Well--steadily enough, as I thought, I pitched my gun up! covered my
bird fairly! pulled!--the trigger gave not to my finger. I tried the
other. Devil's in it, I had forgot to cock my gun! and ere I could
retrieve my error, the bird had topped the bush, and dodged out of
sight, and off--"Mark! mark!--Tim!" I shouted.
"Ey! ey! sur--Ay see's urn!"
"Why, how's that, Frank?" cried Harry. "Couldn't you get a shot?"
"Forgot to cock my gun!" I cried; but at the self-same moment the quick
sharp yelping of the spaniels came on my ear. "Steady, Flash! steady,
sir! Mark!" But close upon the word came the full round report of
Harry's gun. "Mark! again!" shouted Harry, and again his own piece sent
its loud ringing voice abroad. "Mark! now a third! mark, Frank!"
And as he spoke I caught the quick rush of his wing, and saw him dart
across a space, a few yards to my right. I felt my hand shake; I had not
pulled a trigger in ten months, but in a second's space I rallied. There
was an opening just before me between a stumpy thick thorn-bush which
had saved the last bird, and a dwarf cedar; it was not two yards over;
he glanced across it; he was gone, just as my barrel sent its charge
into the splintered branches.
"Beautiful!" shouted Harry, who, looking through a cross glade, saw the
bird fall, which I could not. "Beautiful shot, Frank! Do all your work
like that, and we'll get twenty couple before night!"
"Have I killed him!" answered I, half doubting if he were not quizzing
me.
"Killed him? of course you have; doubled him up completely! But look
sharp! there are more birds before me! I can hardly keep the dogs down,
now! There! there goes one--clean out of shot of me, though! Mark! mark,
Tom! Gad, how the fat dog's running!" he continued. "He sees him! Ten to
one he gets him! There he goes--bang! A long shot, and killed clean!"
"Ready!" cried I. "I'm ready, Archer!"
"Bag your bird, then. He lies under that dock leaf, at the foot of yon
red maple! That's it; you've got him. Steady now, till Tom gets loaded!"
"What did you do?" asked I. "You fired twice, I think!"
"Killed two!" he answered. "Ready, now!" and on he went, smashing away
the boughs before him, while ever and anon I heard his cheery voice,
calling or whistling to his dogs, or rousing up the tenants of some
thickets into which even he could not force his way; and I, creeping, as
best I might, among the tangled brush, now plunging half thigh deep in
holes full of tenacious mire, now blundering over the moss-covered
stubs, pressed forward, fancying every instant that the rustling of the
briers against my jacket was the flip-flap of a rising woodcock.
Suddenly, after bursting through a mass of thorns and wild-vine, which
was in truth almost impassable, I came upon a little grassy spot quite
clear of trees, and covered with the tenderest verdure, through which a
narrow rill stole silently; and as I set my first foot on it, up jumped,
with his beautiful variegated back all reddened by the sunbeams, a fine
and full-fed woodcock, with the peculiar twitter which he utters when
surprised. He had not gone ten yards, however, before my gun was at my
shoulder and the trigger drawn; before I heard the crack I saw him
cringe; and, as the white smoke drifted off to leeward, he fell heavily,
completely riddled by the shot, into the brake before me; while at the
same moment, whir-r-r! up sprung a bevy of twenty quail, at least,
startling me for the moment by the thick whirring of their wings, and
skirring over the underwood right toward Archer. "Mark, quail!" I
shouted, and, recovering instantly my nerves, fired my one remaining
barrel after the last bird! It was a long shot, yet I struck him fairly,
and he rose instantly right upward, towering high! high! into the clear
blue sky, and soaring still, till his life left him in the air, and he
fell like a stone, plump downward!
"Mark him! Tim!"
"Ey! ey! sur. He's a de-ad un, that's a sure thing!"
At my shot all the bevy rose a little, yet altered not their course the
least, wheeling across the thicket directly round the front of Archer,
whose whereabout I knew, though I could neither see nor hear him. So
high did they fly that I could observe them clearly, every bird well
defined against the sunny heavens. I watched them eagerly. Suddenly one
turned over; a cloud of feathers streamed off down the wind; and then,
before the sound of the first shot had reached my ears, a second pitched
a few yards upward, and, after a heavy flutter, followed its hapless
comrade.
Turned by the fall of the two leading birds, the bevy again wheeled,
still rising higher, and now flying very fast; so that, as I saw by the
direction which they took, they would probably give Draw a chance of
getting in both barrels. And so indeed it was; for, as before, long ere
I caught the booming echoes of his heavy gun, I saw two birds keeled
over, and, almost at the same instant, the cheery shout of Tim announced
to me that he had bagged my towered bird! After a little pause, again we
started, and, hailing one another now and then, gradually forced our way
through brake and brier toward the outward verge of the dense covert.
Before we met again, however, I had the luck to pick up a third
woodcock, and as I heard another double shot from Archer, and two single
bangs from Draw, I judged that my companions had not been less
successful than myself. At last, emerging from the thicket, we all
converged, as to a common point, toward Tim; who, with his game-bag on
the ground, with its capacious mouth wide open to receive our game, sat
on a stump with the two setters at a charge beside him.
"What do we score?" cried I, as we drew near; "what do we score?"
"I have four woodcocks, and a brace of quail," said Harry.
"And I, two cock and a brace," cried Tom, "and missed another cock; but
he's down in the meadow here, behind that 'ere stump alder!"
"And I, three woodcock and one quail!" I chimed in, naught abashed.
"And Ay'se marked doon three woodcock--two more beside yon big un, that
measter Draa made siccan a bungle of--and all t' quail--every feather on
um--doon t' bog meadow yonner--ooh! but we'se mak grand sport o't!"
interposed Tim, now busily employed stringing bird after bird up by the
head, with loops and buttons in the game-bag!
"Well done then, all!" said Harry. "Nine timber-doodles and five quail,
and only one shot missed! That's not bad shooting, considering what a
hole it is to shoot in. Gentlemen, here's your health," and filling
himself out a fair sized wine-glassfull of Ferintosh, into the silver
cup of his dram-bottle, he tossed it off; and then poured out a similar
libation for Tim Matlock. Tom and myself, nothing loth, obeyed the hint,
and sipped our modicums of distilled waters out of our private flasks.
"Now, then," cried Archer, "let us pick up these scattering birds. Tom
Draw, you can get yours without a dog! And now, Tim, where are yours?"
"T' first lies oop yonner in yon boonch of brachens, ahint t' big
scarlet maple; and t' other--"
"Well! I'll go to the first. You take Mr. Forester to the other, and
when we have bagged all three, we'll meet at the bog meadow fence, and
then hie at the bevy!"
This job was soon done, for Draw and Harry bagged their birds cleverly
at the first rise; and although mine got off at first without a shot, by
dodging round a birch tree straight in Tim's face, and flew back slap
toward the thicket, yet he pitched in its outer skirt, and as he jumped
up wild I cut him down with a broken pinion and a shot through his bill
at fifty yards, and Chase retrieved him well.
"Cleverly stopped, indeed!" Frank halloaed; "and by no means an easy
shot! and so our work's clean done for this place, at the least!"
"The boy can shoot some," observed Tom Draw, who loved to bother
Timothy; "the boy can shoot some, though he does come from Yorkshire!"
"Gad! and Ay wush Ay'd no but gotten thee i' Yorkshire, measter Draa!"
responded Tim.
"Why! what if you had got me there?"
"What? Whoy, Ay'd clap thee iv a cage, and hug thee round t' feasts and
fairs loike; and shew thee to t' folks at so mooch a head. Ay'se sure
Ay'd mak a fortune o' t!"
"He has you there, Tom! Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Archer. "Tim's down upon
you there, by George! Now, Frank, do fancy Tom Draw in a cage at
Borough-bridge or Catterick fair! Lord! how the folks would pay to look
at him! Fancy the sign board too! The Great American Man-Mammoth! Ha!
ha! ha! But come, we must not stay here talking nonsense, or we shall do
no good. Show me, Tim, where are the quail!"
"Doon t' bog meadow yonner! joost t' slack,* [*Slack--Yorkshire.
Anglice, Moist hollow] see thee, there!" pointing with the stout
black-thorn; "amang yon bits o' bushes!"
"Very well--that's it; now let go the setters; take Flash and Dan along
with you, and cut across the country as straight as you can go to the
spring head, where we lunched last year; that day, you know, Tom, when
McTavish frightened the bull out of the meadow, under the pin-oak tree.
Well! put the champagne into the spring to cool, and rest yourself there
till we come; we shan't be long behind you."
Away went Tim, stopping from time to time to mark our progress, and over
the fence into the bog meadow we proceeded; a rascally piece of broken
tussockky ground, with black mud knee-deep between the hags, all covered
with long grass. The third step I took, over I went upon my nose, but
luckily avoided shoving my gun-barrels into the filthy mire.
"Steady, Frank, steady! I'm ashamed of you!" said Harry; "so hot and so
impetuous; and your gun too at the full cock; that's the reason, man,
why you missed firing at your first bird, this morning. I never cock
either barrel till I see my bird; and, if a bevy rises, only one at a
time. The birds will lie like stones here; and we cannot walk too slow.
Steady, Shot, have a care, sir!"
Never, in all my life, did I see any thing more perfect than the style
in which the setters drew those bogs. There was no more of racing, no
more of impetuous dash; it seemed as if they knew the birds were close
before them. At a slow trot, their sterns whipping their flanks at every
step, they threaded the high tussockks. See! the red dog straightens his
neck, and snuffs the air.
"Look to! look to, Frank! they are close before old Chase!"
Now he draws on again, crouching close to the earth. "Toho! Shot!" Now
he stands! no! no! not yet--at least he is not certain! He turns his
head to catch his master's eye! Now his stern moves a little; he draws
on again.
There! he is sure now! what a picture--his black full eye intently
glaring, though he cannot see any thing in that thick mass of herbage;
his nostril wide expanded, his lips slavering from intense excitement;
his whole form motionless, and sharply drawn, and rigid, even to the
straight stern and lifted foot, as a block wrought to mimic life by some
skilful sculptor's chisel; and, scarce ten yards behind, his
liver-colored comrade backs him--as firm, as stationary, as immovable,
but in his attitude, how different! Chase feels the hot scent steaming up
under his very nostril; feels it in every nerve, and quivers with anxiety
to dash on his prey, even while perfectly restrained and steady. Shot, on
the contrary, though a few minutes since he too was drawing, knows
nothing of himself, perceives no indication of the game's near presence,
although improved by discipline, his instinct tells him that his mate
has found them. Hence the same rigid form, stiff tail, and constrained
attitude, but in his face--for dogs have faces--there is none of that
tense energy, that evident anxiety; there is no frown upon his brow, no
glare in his mild open eye, no slaver on his lip!
"Come up, Tom; come up, Frank, they are all here; we must get in six
barrels; they will not move: come up, I say!"
And on we came, deliberately prompt, and ready. Now we were all in line:
Harry the centre man, I on the right, and Tom on the left hand. The
attitude of Archer was superb; his legs, set a little way apart, as firm
as if they had been rooted in the soil; his form drawn back a little,
and his head erect, with his eye fixed upon the dogs; his gun held in
both hands, across his person, the muzzle slightly elevated, his left
grasping the trigger guard; the thumb of the right resting upon the
hammer, and the fore-finger on the trigger of the left hand barrel; but,
as he had said, neither cocked. "Fall back, Tom, if you please, five
yards or so," he said, as coolly as if he were unconcerned, "and you
come forward, Frank, as many; I want to drive them to the left, into
those low red bushes; that will do: now then, I'll flush them; never
mind me, boys, I'll reserve my fire."
And, as he spoke, he moved a yard or two in front of us, and under his
very feet, positively startling me by their noisy flutter, up sprang the
gallant bevy: fifteen or sixteen well grown birds, crowding and jostling
one against the other. Tom Draw's gun, as I well believe, was at his
shoulder when they rose; at least his first shot was discharged before
they had flown half a rood, and of course harmlessly: the charge must
have been driven through them like a single ball; his second barrel
instantly succeeded, and down came two birds, caught in the act of
crossing. I am myself a quick shot, too quick if anything, yet my first
barrel was exploded a moment after Tom Draw's second; the other
followed, and I had the satisfaction of bringing both my birds down
handsomely; then up went Harry's piece--the bevy being now twenty or
twenty-five yards distant--cocking it as it rose, he pulled the trigger
almost before it touched his shoulder, so rapid was the movement; and,
though he lowered the stock a little to cock the second barrel, a moment
scarcely passed between the two reports, and almost on the instant two
quail were fluttering out their lives among the bog grass.
Dropping his butt, without a word, or even a glance to the dogs, he
quietly went on to load; nor indeed was it needed: at the first shot
they dropped into the grass, and there they lay as motionless as if they
had been dead, with their heads crouched between their paws; nor did
they stir thence till the tick of the gun-locks announced that we again
were ready. Then lifting up their heads, and rising on their fore-feet,
they sat half erect, eagerly waiting for the signal.
"Hold up, good lads!" and on they drew, and in an instant pointed on two
several birds. "Fetch!" and each brought his burthen to our feet; six
birds were bagged at that rise, and thus before eleven o'clock we had
picked up a dozen cock, and within one of the same number of fine quail,
with only two shots missed. The poor remainder of the bevy had dropped,
singly, and scattered, in the red bushes, whither we instantly pursued
them, and where we got six more, making a total of seventeen birds
bagged out of a bevy, twenty strong at first.
One towered bird of Harry's, certainly killed dead, we could not with
all our efforts bring to bag; one bird Tom Draw missed clean, and the
remaining one we could not find again; another dram of whiskey, and into
Seer's great swamp we started: a large piece of woodland, with every
kind of lying. At one end it was open, with soft black loamy soil,
covered with docks and colts-foot leaves under the shade of large but
leafless willows, and here we picked up a good many scattered woodcock;
afterward we got into the heavy thicket with much tangled grass, wherein
we flushed a bevy, but they all took to tree, and we made very little of
them; and here Tom Draw began to blow and labor; the covert was too
thick, the bottom too deep and unsteady for him.
Archer perceiving this, sent him at once to the outside; and three
times, as we went along, ourselves moving nothing, we heard the round
reports of his large calibre. "A bird at every shot, I'd stake my life,"
said Harry, "he never misses cross shots in the open;" at the same
instant, a tremendous rush of wings burst from the heaviest thicket:
"Mark! partridge! partridge!" and as I caught a glimpse of a dozen large
birds fluttering up, one close upon the other, and darting away as
straight and nearly as fast as bullets, through the dense branches of a
cedar brake, I saw the flashes of both Harry's barrels, almost
simultaneously discharged, and at the same time over went the objects of
his aim; but ere I could get up my gun the rest were out of sight. "You
must shoot, Frank, like lightning, to kill these beggars; they are the
ruffed grouse, though they call them partridge here: see! are they not
fine fellows?"
Another hour's beating, in which we still kept picking up, from time to
time, some scattering birds, brought us to the spring head, where we
found Tim with luncheon ready, and our fat friend reposing at his side,
with two more grouse, and a rabbit which he had bagged along the
covert's edge. Cool was the Star champagne; and capital was the cold
fowl and Cheshire cheese; and most delicious was the repose that
followed, enlivened with gay wit and free good humor, soothed by the
fragrance of the exquisite cheroots, moistened by the last drops of the
Ferintosh qualified by the crystal waters of the spring. After an hour's
rest, we counted up our spoil; four ruffed grouse, nineteen woodcocks,
with ten brace and a half of quail beside the bunny, made up our score--
done comfortably in four hours.
"Now we have finished for to-day with quail," said Archer, "but we'll
get full ten couple more of woodcock; come, let us be stirring; hang up
your game-bag in the tree, and tie the setters to the fence; I want you
in with me to beat, Tim; you two chaps must both keep the outside--you
all the time, Tom; you, Frank, till you get to that tall
thunder-shivered ash tree; turn in there, and follow up the margin of a
wide slank you will see; but be careful, the mud is very deep, and
dangerous in places; now then, here goes!"
And in he went, jumping a narrow streamlet into a point of thicket,
through which he drove by main force. Scarce had he got six yards into
the brake, before both spaniels quested; and, to my no small wonder, the
jungle seemed alive with woodcock; eight or nine, at the least, flapped
up at once, and skimmed along the tongue of coppice toward the high
wood, which ran along the valley, as I learned afterward, for full three
miles in length--while four or five more wheeled off to the sides,
giving myself and Draw fair shots, by which we did not fail to profit;
but I confess it was with absolute astonishment that I saw two of those
turned over, which flew inward, killed by the marvelously quick and
unerring aim of Archer, where a less thorough sportsman would have been
quite unable to discharge a gun at all, so dense was the tangled jungle.
Throughout the whole length of that skirt of coppice, a hundred and
fifty yards, I should suppose at the utmost, the birds kept rising as it
were incessantly--thirty-five, or, I think, nearly forty, being flushed
in less than twenty minutes, although comparatively few were killed,
partly from the difficulty of the ground, and partly from their getting
up by fours and fives at once. Into the high wood, however, at the last
we drove them; and there, till daylight failed us, we did our work like
men. By the cold light of the full moon we wended homeward, rejoicing in
the possession of twenty-six couple and a half of cock, twelve brace of
quail--we found another bevy on our way home and bagged three birds
almost by moonlight--five ruffed grouse, and a rabbit. Before our wet
clothes were well changed, supper was ready, and a good blow-out was
followed by sound slumbers and sweet dreams, fairly earned by nine hours
of incessant walking.