Reed-bird Shooting
By H.P. Leland.
- Three men and bull-dog ugly,
- two guns, and a terrier lame:
- They'd better set themselves up for game!
- But no! I see, by the cocking
- Of that red-haired Paddy's eye,
- He's been 'reeding' to much for you, Sir,
- Any such game to try!
-
- 'Whist, Jamey, me boy! kape dark there,
- Who hould the big bull-dog in:
- There's a bloody big cloud of rade-birds
- That nade a peppering'!'
- 'Chip-bang!' speaks the single-barrel;
- 'Flip-booong!' roars the old 'Queen-Anne'
- There's a Paddy stretched out in the mud-hole,
- A kicked over, knocked-down man!
-
- the big-bluu-dog's eyes stick out,
- And the terrier's barks begin;
- The Paddy digs out of the deep mud,
- And then the 'discoursin'' comes in:
- 'Oh Jamey, ye pricious young blag-guard,
- I know ye're the divil's son!
- How many fingers' load, thin,
- Did ye put in this damned old gun?'
-
- 'How many fingers? Be jabers!
- I nivir put in a one!
- D'ye think I'd be afther ramming
- Me fingers into the gun?'
- 'Well give me the powdher, Jamey!'
- 'The powdher! as sure as I'm born,
- I put it all in yer muskit,
- As I had ne'er a powdher-horn!'
- Philadelphia, August, 1853.
December 1853. The Knickerbocker, or New York Monthly Magazine 42(6): 613.