252 GUN, RIFLE, AND HOUND. 



days previously, provided us with that celebrated one- 

 horned stag which took us to the Horner Mill a 

 fourteen-mile point in an hour and fifteen minutes ? 



Our cheery host was standing on the doorsteps as 

 we drove up. 



" That's right," said he ; " now come in and have a 

 cup of beer or zider after your drive." 



A quarter of an hour later saw us at work. The 

 farm was so laid out that most of the fences ran 

 parallel to the big woodlands ; the connecting fences 

 running up and down hill were mostly short. All the 

 fences consisted of high banks covered with thick 

 beech and other scrub, and some were overgrown 

 with bushy ivy. 



We began by beating the fences nearest the 

 coverts. The few pheasants which we found here 

 required very quick shooting to prevent their falling 

 into the wood, where they would probably have been 

 lost, as we had no retriever. At last these were fully 

 beaten out, and then the cream of the day's shooting 

 began. Along the shoulder of the hill ran one or two 

 fields separated by especially thick fences. Our one 

 beater, with an old spaniel, beat carefully along these 

 from the upper side, the host standing just below the 



fence, and T and I half across the field, some 



distance apart. Our host was, truth to tell, a poorer 

 shot than he was horseman, and the bulk of the birds 

 came over us two, and having gathered both way and 

 elevation gave very pretty shots. I don't mean to say 

 that there were a great many birds in the fence ; for 

 my host had not led me to expect more than a rough 



