Anxious not to fail in this first trial, I got down flat on the ground
and crawled snake-fashion for a distance of fifty or sixty yards,
until I was less than twenty yards from the birds, when I fired and
killed one.
That first duck was a great joy, and having succeeded so well with my
careful tactics, I continued in the same way, confining my attention
to pairs or small parties of three or four birds, when by patiently
creeping a long distance through the grass I could get very close to
them. In this way I shot teal, widgeon, pintail, shovellers, and
finally the noble rosy-bill, which was esteemed for the table above
all the others.
My brother, ambitious of a big bag, invariably went a distance from
home in quest of the large flocks, and despised my way of duck-
shooting; but it sometimes vexed him to find on his return from a
day's expedition that I had succeeded in getting as many birds as
himself without having gone much more than a mile from home.
Some months after I had started shooting I began to have trouble with
my beloved gun, owing to a weakness it had developed in its lock - one
of the infirmities incidental to age which the gunsmiths of Buenos
Ayres were never able to cure effectually.
