Shooting luncheons--Cold tea and a crust--Clear turtle--Such larks!--Jugged duck and oysters--Woodcock pie--Hunting luncheons--Pie crusts--The true Yorkshire pie--Race-course luncheons--Suggestions to caterers--The "Jolly Sand boys" stew--Various recipes--A race-course sandwich--Angels' pie--"Suffolk pride"--Devilled larks--A light lunch in the Himalayas. There is no meal which has become more "expanded" than a shooting luncheon. A crust of bread with cheese, or a few biscuits, and a flask of sherry sufficed for our forebears, who, despite inferior weapons and ammunition, managed to "bring 'em down" quite as effectually as do the shootists of this period. Most certainly and decidedly, a heavy luncheon is a mistake if you want to "shoot clean" afterwards. And bear this in mind, all ye "Johnnies" who rail at your host's champagne and turtle, after luncheon, in a comfortable pavilion in the midst of a pheasant _battue_, and whose very beaters would turn up their noses at a pork pie and a glass of old ale, that there is nothing so good to shoot upon as cold tea, unless it be cold coffee. I have tried both, and for a shooting luncheon _par excellence_ commend me to a crust and a pint of cold tea, eaten whilst sitting beneath the shelter of an unpleached hedge, against the formal spread which commences with a _consommé_, and finishes with guinea peaches, and liqueurs of rare curaçoa. Of course, it is assumed that the shooter wishes to make a bag. But as, fortunately for trade, everybody does not share my views, it will be as well to append a few dishes suitable to a scratch meal of this sort. First of all let it be said that a _Roast Loin of Pork_, washed down with sweet champagne, is not altogether to be commended. I have nothing to urge against roast pork, on ordinary occasions, or champagne either; but a woodcock takes a lot of hitting. Such a pudding as was sketched in the preceding chapter is allowable, as is also the Lancashire Hot-Pot. _Shepherd's Pie_, _i.e._ minced meat beneath a mattress of mashed potatoes, with lots of gravy in the dish, baked, is an economical dish, but a tasty one; and I have never known much left for the beaters. RABBIT PIE, or Pudding, will stop a gap most effectually, and _Plover Pudding_ --the very name brings water to the lips--is entitled to the highest commendation. This is the favourite dish at the shooting luncheons of a well-known Royal Duke, and when upon one occasion the discovery was made that through some misunderstanding said pudding had been devoured to the very bones, by _the loaders_, the--well, "the band played," as they say out West. And a stirring tune did that band play too. _Such Larks!_