12 REMINISCENCES OF A HUNTSMAN 



had rented for years under my family, and to whom my father 

 advanced the first twenty pounds he ever had in hand to begin 

 with, after having made by the farm a very large fortune, 

 qualified, and with a certificate, on the last season of holding 

 his land, not only shot at the game himself, but invited the 

 tag, rag, and bobtail of the neighbourhood to do the same. 

 Unluckily, at my fathers death, there were no reservations made 

 as to sporting, and this man, therefore, for a time, could do as 

 he pleased. He rented the park and every inch of land around 

 the covers. Not content with shooting fairly, on finding that 

 he, himself, could hit nothing in motion, I have seen him stop 

 his plough when the pheasants, in line, had been following the 

 furrow to pick up insects or anything he turned up, and, 

 resting his gun on the stilts, fire among them, killing and 

 wounding, at one shot, a considerable number. Such conduct 

 as this was not likely to be tolerated by us, and I set my wits to 

 work to be even with him. A considerable flock of sheep of his 

 being in the park, while he was in church one Sunday, my 

 brother Moreton and myself captured the bellman of the flock, 

 and with about six feet of whipcord fastened a dead rook to his 

 tail, and then let him go. Away he went after the flock, who, 

 while we were thus tailing their leader, had collected, and were 

 standing some way off gazing at us. As soon as they saw him 

 coming at best pace, with what seemed to be a little black dog 

 after him, away they went, and round and round the park the 

 chase continued, the bellman, haunted by the rook, gregariously 

 pursuing, with his friends all flying his presence because of the 

 thing he brought behind him. Ditch after ditch, at length, 

 were full of sheep that in their terror had become cast on their 

 backs, and the bellman, a stout black-faced Southdown, was 

 reduced to a trot. All at once he seemed resolved to face his 

 pursuer ; and having no wind for further flight, and not much 

 of a flock left to run after, old woolly-sides turned at bay, and 

 making a dead halt, and facing about, he brought the rook 

 within about three feet of his nose. There he stood, stamping 

 at his foe, and panting ; the heaving of his sides making the 



