BEGGARS ON HORSEBACK. 127 



selves to a pair of shears, which, moved by unseen 

 hands at the inner side of a hedge, was clapping 

 its jaws malevolently among the topmost privet 

 sprouts. There was a small hotel at the other side 

 of the road, and neither lane nor farmhouse was in 

 sight ; but a voice from behind the hedge informed 

 us in unusually fluent English that the short cut 

 to Llanberis started precisely from the yard of the 

 hotel. The yard was deserted, but some sem- 

 blance of a track wandered from it, and we sur- 

 rendered ourselves to it. It met with an early 

 death at the gateway of a large, steep field, 

 unpleasantly filled with cattle and young horses, 

 and we were on the point of turning back to insult 

 the man with the shears, when a cow in our vicinity 

 lay down to ruminate, and disclosed a fat, yellow- 

 haired boy who had been standing behind her. 

 To him the stimulating copper was at once ad- 

 ministered, and under his guidance we pursued an 

 imperceptible path through the cattle up to the 

 hill, with a confidence not shared by the Tommies, 

 who were, indeed, but moderate mountaineers. 



