CHAPTER XII 



WINTRY DAYS 



1^\URING the colder and wetter months the 

 ** barely traceable tracks through the woods 

 (in summer the pleasantest of paths) do not afford 

 good walking, and only the woodman, keeper, and 

 poacher traverse them. Ordinary persons shun 

 the sticky clays over which so many of these ( 

 summer highways run ; they like not the fresh? 

 growth of briar and bramble on either side, now 

 hardened, spread as though in eagerness towards 

 the pedestrian, with spikes and talons ready to 

 pierce his ankles and hook his clothes. The 

 fallen leaves are too heavy to rustle in the light 

 breeze. They often hide some slanting root, wet 

 and slippery, which rejects the touch of a boot, and 

 causes the walker an anxious moment, if not a falljj 

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