THE TWELFTH.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE SPECTATOR.'9
Sin,—" Z." makes an appeal in your last issue that no shot grouse be placed still alive in "a beater's pocket or game. bag." One hopes that such receptacles are never used for grouse. At all well-managed grouse-shootings, whether "over dogs" or "driving," open hand-carriers are used to cool the birds before they are committed to the basket panniers, and in such cases it is quite easy to see if a bird is not quite dead and to administer the coup de grace. But there is a much more likely and frequent source of unnecessary cruelty to these sporting birds in the perfunctory manner in which inexperienced sportsmen when grouse-driving mark down their birds, which makes it impossible for the gamekeepers when they come up with the beaters to find all the birds, especially the wounded. If shooters were to exercise more care in marking the spots where their birds fall, and would also see that each bird was properly searched for, many a poor bird would be delivered from a lingering death by being speedily and humanely despatched.—I am, Sir, &c.,
H. S. S-
Previous page
