172 HAMPSHIRE DAYS 



poison fangs which he could probably see every time 

 she smiled to encourage him. At the end of my long 

 watch the conclusion of the whole complex business 

 seemed farther off than ever : fear had got the mastery, 

 and the male had put so great a distance between 

 them, and moved now so languidly, that it seemed 

 useless to remain any longer. 



I had not been watching alone all this time : when 

 I had been about half-an-hour on the spot I had a 

 visitor, a small miserable-looking New Forest boy ; he 

 came walking towards me with a little crooked stick 

 in his hand, and asked me in a low, husky voice if I 

 had seen a pony in that part of the Forest. I told 

 him sharply not to come too near as his steps would 

 disturb a spider I was watching. It did not seem to 

 surprise him that I was there by myself watching a 

 spider, but creeping up he subsided gently on the heath 

 by my side and began watching with me. At inter- 

 vals when there was a lull in the excitement of the 

 spiders I could spare time for a glance at my poor 

 little companion. He was probably eleven or twelve 

 years old, but his stature was that of a boy of eight 

 a small, stunted creature, meanly dressed, with light- 

 coloured lustreless hair, pale-blue eyes, and a weary 

 sad expression on his pale face. Yet he called himself 

 a gipsy ! But the south of England gipsies are a mixed 

 and degenerate lot. They are now so incessantly 

 harried by the authorities that the best of them settle 

 down hi the villages, while those who keep to the old 



