After September is past the shooting man will not get very much sport on the Cotswolds, as far as the partridges are concerned, for they are not numerous enough to be worth driving; they soon become as wild as they can possibly be.  On Hatherop and some other estates good partridge driving is enjoyed.  The farmers are very fond of shooting them under a “kite,”—­this, as it is hardly necessary to explain, is an artificial representation of the hawk.  It is flown high up in the air at some distance ahead of the guns.  The birds, seeing what they take to be a very large and savage-looking hawk hovering above them, ready to pounce down at a moment’s notice, become frightened, and lie crouching in the hedges and turnips, until they almost have to be kicked up by the sportsmen.  But when once they do get up they fly straight away, nor do they come back for a long time.  This mode of shooting is all very well once in a way, but if indulged in habitually it scares the birds, driving them on to other manors.  Not having seen it successfully carried out, we are not fond of the method, but there are good sportsmen in these parts who advocate it.  Some maintain that this cannot be called a really sportsmanlike way of shooting partridges, though there is doubtless room for two opinions on the question.

Later on in the autumn, when November frosts begin to attract snipes to the withybeds and water meadows by the Coln, the unambitious gunner may often enjoy the charm of a small and select mixed bag.

Two of us went out for an hour last winter before breakfast, having been informed that a woodcock was lying in an ash copse by the river.  We got the woodcock—­a somewhat rara avis in small, isolated coverts on the hills; in addition, the bag contained one snipe, one wild duck, two pheasants, six rabbits, a pigeon, a heron, and some moorhens.  Now this was very good sport, because it was totally unexpected.  The majority of shooting people might not think much of so small a bag, but it must be remembered that the charm of this kind of shooting is its wildness.  It seems rather hard to kill herons, but anybody who has tried to preserve trout will agree that herons are the greatest enemies with which the trout-fisher has to contend.  One heron will clear a shallow stream in a very short time.  When the floods are out, trout fall a ready prey to these rapacious birds.  The kingfishers likewise have a very good time.  The fish will gorge themselves with worms picked up on the inundated meadows, until they are so full that the worms actually begin falling out of their mouths.  I picked several up last autumn which had been stabbed, I suppose, by a heron.  They were unharmed, save for a small round hole, as if made by a bullet; there was no other mark on them.  But when taken up, the worms came out of their mouths by the score!  Kingfishers are carefully preserved, in spite of their destructiveness, but one must draw the line at herons.