256 A MEDLEY OF SPORT 



into the black depths of the pool. May he long escape 

 the net of the prowling poacher and the sharp tusks of 

 the otters which inhabit his native stream in some 

 numbers. 



Our attention was next turned to the high double 

 hedgerows, clumps of covert, and strips of spinney, which 

 remained unshot, when, notwithstanding that there were 

 no " warm corners," some very pretty sport was obtained. 

 A description of how the doctor and myself worked the 



hedgerows, while D and H acted as stops in 



gateways and other convenient hiding-places along the 

 " doubles " ; how this long-tail was killed ; how that one 

 missed ; how we succeeded in driving many of the out- 

 lying pheasants into the ten- acre covert ; how one of the 

 beaters was found with the tail-feathers of a fine young 

 cock sticking out of the big pocket of his fustian jacket, 

 which, " without a word of a loie, he wor a-going to take 

 to a sick friend " (probably the village publican) "to make 

 a mess o' soup for 'un — poore chap " — would prove 

 monotonous reading. Suffice it to say that every man of 

 us enjoyed that impromptu day's sport under the beauti- 

 ful hills of Kent. To the jovial doctor's last shot fell 

 the rara avis of the day, in the shape of a woodcock, 

 which was flushed by one of the dogs from a clump of 

 holly bushes growing on the outskirts of a little copse. 



