CHAPTER IV. 



GAMEKEEPERS : THEIR FRIENDS AND FOES. 



DURING our travels in search of materials for 

 camera and notebook we have naturally fallen 

 in with many gamekeepers and learnt a great deal 

 about their friends and enemies, and it is my inten- 

 tion to give in the present chapter some account of 

 what we have heard and seen whilst wandering about 

 on great game preserves in all parts of the country. 



Gamekeepers as a class are shrewd, practical 

 fellows, with an intense belief in what they know 

 from experience, and an extreme contempt for any- 

 thing in the nature of book-learning about the life 

 of the fields, woods, and moors. 



I have surprised many of them, who would 

 listen to my bird stories with good-natured in- 

 credulity, by proving a practical knowledge of the 

 ways of vermin and the best methods of stopping 

 their ravages ; and one at least attests the value 

 of my advice in regard to destroying common 

 Brown Rats. 



He was telling me what trouble these artful 

 depredators gave him, and of their cunning in 

 avoiding his traps. I said, "You should place 

 your steel gins in that water" (pointing to a 

 shallow creek crossed by a rat-track running along 

 the side of a small lake) "if you want to catch 

 them." 



