t can
kill woodcock in close cover, or well-grown snipe on a windy day; but
there are few, who can do these things, who can kill with both barrels
in their first goose-shooting. The size and number of the birds, the
wary and cautious manner of their approach, the nice modulations
necessary to "call" them successfully, and the reckless sweep with which
they seem to throw aside all fear, and rush into the very jaws of
death,--all these combine to unsettle the nerves and aim of the novice.

All this Kennedy experienced, as he saw above him twenty outstretched
necks, with jetty heads, whose eyes he felt _must_ discern the ambush;
twenty snowy bellies, against which as many pairs of black, broad,
webbed feet showed with beautiful effect, and forty broad pinions, which
seemed to shut out the sky from view, and present a mark which no one
could fail to hit. At the word he pointed his heavy gun at the centre of
the thickest part of the flock and fired. At the first barrel a dead
bird fell almost into the boat; but the second seemed without effect. La
Salle "lined" four as they flapped their huge wings hurriedly, striving
to flee from the hidden danger, killing three and breaking the wing of a
fourth, who fluttered down to the ice, and began to run, or, rather, to
waddle rapidly away.

Kennedy seemed about to go after the wounded bird, but La Salle laid his
hand on his arm.

"Don't move, Kennedy, and he will get us another bird," said he,
reloading his heavy gun with a long-range shot cartridge. "We can get
that bird any time; and there is his mate flying round and round in a
circle."

"You won't get a shot at her," said Kennedy, as she warily kept out of
ordinary range, and finally alighted near the gander, which, weak with
pain and loss of blood, had lain down on the ice about one hundred and
fifty yards distant.

"I should not despair of killing her with 'the Baby,' charged as she now
is, even at a far greater distance; but I have a surer weapon for such a
mark in this target-rifle."

As he spoke, he drew from under the half-deck of the boat a heavy
sporting-rifle, carrying about sixty balls to the pound, and sighted
with "globe" or "peep" sights. Taking a polished gauge which hung at his
watch-chain, he set the rear sight, and, cocking the piece, set the
hair-trigger. Noiselessly raising the muzzle above the gunwale, he ran
his eye along the sights. A whip-like crack echoed across the ice, and
the goose, pierced thro