A Cart-load of Game. 159 



comfortably along, with their game hidden under an 

 old sack or some straw. 



Their next essay is among the ploughed fields, 

 where the corn is ripening and as yet no reapers are 

 at work, so that the coast is almost clear. Here they 

 pick up a leveret, and perhaps the dogs chop a weakly 

 young partridge, unable to fly well, in the hedge. 

 The keeper has just strolled through the copses 

 bordering on the road, and has left them, as he 

 thinks, safe. They watch his figure slowly disappear- 

 ing in the distance from a bend of the lane, and 

 then send the dogs among the underwood. In the 

 winter men will carry ferrets with them in a trap 

 like this. 



The desperate gangs who occasionally sweep the 

 preserves, defying the keepers in their strength of 

 numbers and prestige of violence, sometimes bring 

 with them a horse and cart, not so much for speed of 

 escape as to transport a heavy bag of game. Such a 

 vehicle, driven by one man, will, moreover, often 

 excite no suspicion though it may be filled with 

 pheasants under sacks and hay. A good deal of 

 what may be called casual poaching is also done on 

 wheels. 



Some of the landlords of the low beer-houses in 

 the country often combine with the liquor trade the 



