WALK IN RURAL ENGLAND. 17 



England, we should be able to keep a larger 

 number of live stock on our farms. 



Leaving Hurstbourne Tarrant for Andover, 

 one passes through Doles Wood. Here I 

 lingered awhile, for it was here that I was 

 once again impressed with the resourcefulness, 

 the thrift, the endurance of the Enirlish 

 peasant, especially the peasant who is a crafts- 

 man of the woods. I heard the sound of a 

 billhook at work in the woods, and this to me 

 is always an alluring sound. I found the 

 woodman, a man of from fifty to sixty years 

 of age, making hurdles. 



" Be you the gen'leman as come round 

 with the squire t'other day ? " he asked me. 



" Who is the squire ? " I asked. 



"Mr. Dewar," he answered. 



" Mr. George Dewar?" I asked with interest. 



" He be the son of the squire," the wood- 

 man answered promptly. " He give me one 

 of 'is books." 



At last I had happened on an estate owned 

 by one of the old race of squires. The wood- 

 man became communicative, and after inquir- 

 ing with that courtesy so characteristic of 

 the country poor, if I cared to listen to his 



" clatter," proceeded to talk to me of his life. 



2 



