CHAPTER IIIFor Gunners
The night before the opening of the partridge season, a gunner and his dog were crouching under some bushes. The time was five minutes to twelve. The dog was getting restless.
“Hold on, Feldman—only five minutes more—and then we can go for them!”
A gentleman who had spent some time in India and had been on several tiger hunts, was asked whether he found it pleasant sport. “Oh,” he replied, “it is very pleasant sport as long as you are chasing the tiger, but should he happen to chase you, it has its drawbacks.”
A poor Jew was tramping through a forest. Suddenly a wolf came running towards him. Dreadfully frightened the Jew raised his staff, but fortunately at the same moment, a hunter who was lurking behind some bushes, shotat the wolf and killed him. “God’s blessing,” cried the Jew, who did not see the gunner, but had heard the shot: “I have carried this staff for twenty years, and never knew that it was loaded!”
“Something remarkable happened to me yesterday. I went gunning and saw two rabbits, about twenty-five feet apart, taking a nap in the grass. Now what to do to get them, I hardly knew. Quickly I pulled the two barrels of my gun apart, drew the trigger and both rabbits were mine.”
A, relating his first gunning adventure:—“What do you think of this, gentlemen! Some time ago, while I was on the lookout for game, along comes a rabbit and sits down not far from me. I shoot, but the rabbit does not move. I shoot again, but still the rabbit does not budge. Now my patience is at an end. I run towards him, and when I get close enough to knock him down, up rises my rabbit and is off. Now how do you explain this, gentlemen?”
Old Gunner:—“Well, that rabbit read you all right. He thought: As long as he onlyshoots, there is no danger; but when he comes himself, then it’s time to skip.”
Gunner:—“You always insisted that your old gun did not shoot straight, but now that you have a new one, you don’t seem to hit anything, either.”
Sunday Gunner:—“Yes, but now the rabbits don’t run straight.”
Gunner:—“I should just like to know whether that dark speck over there is a driver or a deer.”
Förster:—“We can soon find out. You just shoot at it; if you hit it, it is a driver; if you don’t, it’s certain that it is a deer.”
Gunner (who has shot a rabbit at last):—“Oh, for some witnesses to this!”
Baron (to his neighbor at a pheasant hunt):—“Did you not notice; I hit that pheasant—the feathers flew!”
Förster:—“Yes, I saw it—so did the pheasant.”
Poacher:—“Your Reverence, I have a beautiful deer for sale.”
His Reverence:—“A deer? What? Did you say a deer, Seppel? How long is it since I reasoned with you and tried to make you understand what a bad fellow you are! Did I not tell you that if you shoot a deer, you commit a great crime and that such a deer is as good as stolen? My, but I am angry! Seppel, take that deer right to the kitchen, I don’t want to see any more of it.”
Förster:—“Now I have caught you—what are you doing here with that gun?”
Poacher:—“Oh, my! Herr Förster, I am so down on my luck, that I thought I’d just go into the woods and shoot—myself.”
A:—“Have you heard the news? The Oberförster shot four deer yesterday!”
B:—“He told me he got two.”
A:—“Is that possible? Why, I spoke to him only about five minutes ago, at the Golden Star Inn.”
B:—“Oh, that explains it. I spoke to him half an hour ago.”
Clerk (to his principal):—“Can I have this afternoon off, sir,—an old aunt of mine is to be buried?”
Principal:—“Very well, but the next time you bury an aunt, you might bring me a couple of rabbits.”
A gentleman just returned from Brazil, boasted of the many gorillas he had killed there. “That must have been very difficult,” remarked one of the listeners.
“It certainly was,” said the narrator, “but I knew how to take advantage of the monkey’s passion for imitating us.”
“How?”
“It was very simple. In places where I suspected the presence of gorillas, I loaded a pistol with a blind cartridge, turned it upon myself and fired; then I left a heavily loaded one on the ground and retired. Returning to the place later on, I invariably found the carcass of a gorilla, who had shot himself.”
A good shot knows when he has missed; a poor one does not know when he has hit.
Gunner:—“Would you believe that I shot ninety-nine rabbits within two hours?”
Host:—“Why don’t you say one hundred at once?”
Gunner:—“You don’t think I’d make a liar of myself for just one rabbit?”
Lehman:—“Gentlemen, I must tell you a pretty story of my friend Muller! Recently, while out gunning, he shot at a rabbit, but, of course, missed him. Now instead of running away, the rabbit went up to friend Muller, bowed and said quite distinctly: ‘Excuse me, sir, but I wish to congratulate you. You shot at me to-day for the twenty-fifth time, without hitting me!’”
Muller:—“My friend Lehman’s story needs a supplement. You must know that I introduced myself to that rabbit. ‘What,’ cried the rabbit, very pale, ‘your name is Muller! I thought it was Lehman!’ and he is off like a flash.”
Förster:—“Sepp, the squire is coming to-day. He is going to hunt.”
Sepp:—“Then I had better go at once and lock up the dogs.”
Förster:—“Yes, and the calf too. The cow you might leave in the field.”
Sepp:—“Don’t know about that.”
Förster:—“Well, lock her up too; better be on the safe side.”
“Well this is killing! I shoot at a rabbit and hit a snipe!”
A gunner tells the following story of a dog’s astonishing cleverness. The dog received every day from his master two pennies, to go to the baker’s and get for himself some rolls to eat for breakfast. The master watching him, noticed that for several days, he came home without his rolls. He followed him, and saw him come from a butcher’s with a piece of sausage. For five days the dog had saved his pennies until he had enough to buy the piece of sausage.
At a hunt a farmer saw a badger slip into a hole, and at once he put his hand in to capture the animal. A hunter who was present, asked the farmer: “Have you caught him?” The farmer, whose hand the badger was biting hard, screamed: “No, but he has caught me!”
Warden:—“Now, Killian, you are free once more. I hope you will let this term in prison be a warning to you, to curb your passion for poaching. You are a family man, and you ought to have more consideration for your poor wife and young children.”
Killian (moved to tears):—“Oh yes, sir, I see you mean well by me. You just wait and see if I don’t bring to you the first deer I can shoot!”
Gunner:—“Say, sonny, did you see a rabbit running this way?”
Boy:—“I did, sir!”
Gunner:—“How long ago?”
Boy:—“’Bout three years ago last Christmas.”
Count A—— had lately returned from the South of Asia. Several of his friends called on him to invite him to a hunt. “Gentlemen,” he said, languidly, “I am now so used to hunting tigers, that a hunt without danger to life, has no attractions for me.”
“Well,” said one of the hunters, drily, “don’t let that worry you; I shot at my brother-in-law yesterday, while we were out gunning!”
(Two farmers going through a field.) A:—“What are you running all at once for? You are not afraid of a rabbit?”
B:—“Rabbit! Who cares for a rabbit! But where there is a rabbit, there is a gunner not far off. I don’t care to have him blaze away at me.”
An old Oberförster told the following yarn:—“You can never imagine, gentlemen, the number of bears there are in Russia, unless, like myself, you have been there. Once a friend and myself made an excursion from Petersburg to the hunting-ground in Finland. We had not been on the lookout very long, when my friendwhispered: ‘There are two coming this way—you can take the right one, I the left one.’ A double shot, and both monsters were rolling on the ground. At that instant several more bears appeared. Bang—bang—bang—and they are all stretched on the ground, in less than a minute.”
“Oh, but how did you get time to load your guns, sir?”
“Oh, pshaw! In our excitement we never thought of that!”
Herr von N. was a passionate lover of hunting, and though he seldom hit anything, he boasted the more. He was giving a large dinner-party, and, as usual on such occasions, had his man-servant standing behind his chair, so he could appeal to him, as a witness of his heroic deeds. “Now, gentlemen, I must tell you of a very remarkable shot I made the other day. I shot a very large deer through the right hind leg and the right ear. What do you think of that?” Everybody laughed.
“John, you were there,” cried Herr von N., “you can testify to it.”
“Most certainly,” replied the servant, “it is all perfectly true. The deer—if the gentlemenwill forgive my mentioning it—was scratching his ear at the very moment my master hit it.” The laughter grew to a roar. John stooped over his master and whispered in his ear: “When your Honor tells a story next, please don’t have things so far apart or I might not be able to put them together as well.”
“Will you permit me, friend, to shoot one of the ducks in this pond? I’ll give you two marks for it.”
“Certainly, sir!”
The gunner pays the money, kills the duck, and, encouraged by his luck, asks the farmer if he may have a second one, pays him two more marks and kills another duck.
“Would you allow me to shoot a third one?”
“Sure, shoot all you want to; the ducks don’t belong to me, but to my neighbor.”
Farmer (to another):—“I caught a rabbit yesterday. He won’t get into my cabbage patch again!”
Förster (coming up behind):—“So, that’s right; and pray what did you do with that rabbit, you rascal?”
Farmer:—“Well, well, what should I have done with him! Look here, sir; I just took the beast, belabored his fur well with my stick and carried him into the next field. He won’t come back here!”
Förster:—“Don’t doubt it at all!”
Förster:—“Well, Doctor, what did you shoot?”
Doctor:—“Oh, ah—I—killed one rabbit—and—wounded three.”
City Swell:—“What a magnificent animal a fully grown deer is! How old do they get?”
Gamekeeper:—“Well, you see, that depends on—when they are shot!”
Förster (to gunner):—“What did you shoot at?”
“At a doe, sir,—but I missed her!”
“What, you shot at a doe? Haven’t you any eyes in your head? You ought to be ashamed of yourself (furiously) to shoot at a doe—and then to miss her besides!”
Förster (to a gunner, who instead of rabbits, has killed several dogs):—“Say, when you are done with the dogs, tell us, so we can clear out in time!”
Teacher (to the Förster’s son):—“Are there many rabbits in your father’s district?”
Pupil:—“Oh yes, sir, lots!”
Teacher:—“That’s queer; I never saw one.”
A:—“Well, aren’t you coming yet?”
B:—“It takes that fellow a long time to get his duds together!”
A:—“You haven’t forgotten anything? You’ve got the ham, the sausage, the pheasant?”
C:—“Yes, I have them; I haven’t forgotten a thing.”
A:—“Then let’s be off!”
C (Pulling his mustache):—“Good gracious! I did forget something!”
A:—“What is it?”
C:—“I left my gun at home!”
Baron von Rothschild has made it a strictrule that none of his guests are to take any of the game shot on his preserves away with them. Though he knew this, a gentleman wished to take home to his wife, one of the pheasants he had shot. He hung it up the chimney in his room, and in the evening hid it in his bag. Early the following morning Baron Rothschild came into his guest’s room to take leave of him and at the same time to see whether his friend was going with his gunning bag empty. A setter had followed the Baron into the room, and as he smelled the bird at once, he hunted all over the room until he finally pulled the finest pheasant from the guest’s bag. “You see, Baron, knowing that you send to market all the game that is killed here for you, I retained this pheasant to mark him and so be able to recognize him at the market stall. Farewell!”
A:—“I tell you, when I count what my license costs, what my board comes to, while on a gunning trip, what I ruin in clothes and boots, what my neglect of business amounts to, every rabbit I kill costs me about twenty marks!”
B:—“Then you may thank your stars that you hit so few.”
Canon, the well-known painter, who died recently, was an enthusiastic gunner. Often during the gunning season he would join other friends of the sport at the hotel, and experiences would be exchanged. Now Canon hated all extravagant, impossible yarns, and one evening when some gunners tried to outdo each other, his patience gave way. His strong voice rose above the din, and everybody listened to the following story: “My setter dog,” he began, “has the finest sense of smell; a finer does not exist. One day we were out partridge hunting, but had no luck; after a three hours’ tramp not a shot had been fired. Suddenly my dog stood still, and then began scratching at the root of a small bush. We approached cautiously. The dog kept on digging, and after he had made quite a hole, one of us went up and helped him. All of a sudden he brought to me—a new porcelain pipe with a partridge painted on it. I always carry it with me as a souvenir.” He put his hand in his pocket and laid the pipe on the table. Shouts of laughter greeted it, but there were no more gunning yarns after that.