A MANOR HOUSE IN DEER LAND. 185 



nearly stepped on. A partridge net is held 

 by a man at each end and dragged along 

 the ground. It is weighted to keep one side 

 of it heavy and close to the earth, and in 

 action somewhat resembles a trawl. The 

 poachers know where birds are roosting, 

 and drag the net over them. They will not 

 move till then, when they rise, and the instant 

 the poachers hear anything in the net they 

 drop it, and find the birds beneath it. Poach- 

 ing varies in localities ; where hares abound 

 it is hare-poaching, or rabbits— as the case 



may be. 



The most desperate poachers are those 

 who enter the woods in the winter for 

 pheasants. They shoot pheasants, and some- 

 times in the deep-wooded coombes, where 

 the sound rolls and echoes for several 

 seconds from the rocks, it is difficult to tell 

 where the gun was fired. It might have 

 been at one end of the valley or at the 

 other. The gangs, however, who shoot phea- 

 sants openly declare their indifference as to 



