164 ART AND PRACTICE OF HAWKING 



for some bushes that are not far off, but as he goes the hawk 

 knocks him over with a severe cut, and though he gets up again 

 and staggers on, she has him well before he can reach the bush. 

 With the next blackbird we have no end of excitement under 

 and round a tree in the fence, the fugitive several times baffling 

 us as we are driving him along towards a bare place in the 

 hedge, and compelling us to hark back and begin driving him 

 up again. Once he comes out a yard, and whips back again 

 instantly. The hawk goes again up into an oak-tree near the 

 gate. Now we drive on furiously, hoping that at the gate, 

 anyhow, he will take wing. Some time before we get there he 

 loses patience and ventures a flight across the field. Ruby gets 

 a poor start, but the blackbird makes a bad use of his chance, 

 allowing the hawk to recover lost ground rapidly, and makes 

 such a weak attempt to get inside a brake that he is taken on 

 the top — perhaps dazed with all the noise and hustling in the 

 fence. 



The next is a very plucky young cock, found in a short 

 piece of hedge by a wire fence. In and out of the wire fence 

 he shifts very cleverly, and only just saves himself in a holly 

 bush. Here he establishes himself in a nearly impregnable 

 fortress, made up of an earth-bank, with some tangled roots, 

 and an infinity of quickset, wild rose, and bramble. The yapping 

 of Sandy, the shouts of the beaters, and the howls of an under- 

 gardener, who in the ardour of pursuit has torn his cheek open 

 with a briar — all are unavailing to storm the citadel until some- 

 one with a well-directed thrust nearly pins him by the tail. 

 Then at last he is off in real earnest towards a thick brake. 

 Before he can get there Ruby compels him with a knock on 

 the back to drop down on the ground, and though he gets up 

 and shuffles into the brake, he is evidently the worse for wear. 

 It takes ten minutes' hard work to dislodge him again, and 

 even when dislodged he dodges back after going a few yards. 

 At last, as it is getting dark, he happens to go out just under 

 the spot where the hawk is sitting, and she collars him above 

 the ditch, dropping into it with him. A flight of half an hour, 

 " including stoppages," and hard work all the time — for the 

 men ! 



Another day we are out with Lady Macbeth, a young eyess 

 with broad shoulders, large feet, and a very small head. The 

 luck is against us at first. We are foiled by a blackbird and 

 outflown by a thrush, and have failed to find any water-hens. 

 At length a blackbird is marked down in a field of swedes in 



