32 ON THE ITHON 



the broad backs of a score of beautiful Hereford 

 cows, finding shelter from the fierce sun under the 

 bridge, placidly chewing the cud, and lashing 

 their sides with their tails to swish off myriads of 

 flies, particularly that abominable dun fly, and the 

 bree, which sticks to them like a leech and some- 

 times drives them almost mad. 



We expected to be met here by a carriage to 

 take us back home, but no carriage was here. 

 We begged or bought some milk at a cottage, and 

 then we learnt to our dismay that we had arrived, 

 not at Alpine Bridge, but at the bridge of Bryn 

 Domas ! We had travelled two hard miles in the 

 wrong direction. We ought to have gone up the 

 left stem of the pothook in order to find Alpine 

 Bridge. To retrace our steps by the river would 

 have involved a five-mile walk, but striking across 

 country over a wild common, from our point of 

 the pothook at the top of the right stem, we 

 struggled on "o'er moor and fen, o'er crag and 

 torrent," till we reached the old mill, where our 

 carriage had been waiting for us for two hours. 

 It was about two miles across, over a rough 

 common and through pleasant meadows, where 

 we again encountered the long-beaked, long-legged, 

 silver-tongued curlew, scolding us in a way which 

 haunts me still. 



The Alpine Bridge is down stream from Shaky 

 Bridge, not up, though it is much farther from 

 Llandrindod ; we found it to be quite new ; in 

 fact, a carpenter was just putting down the last 



