162 BIRD LIFE IN ENGLAND. 



fifty acre plot, who had stolen at earliest dawn into the 

 patch of corn left uncut from yesterday's work, meeting 

 their fate from the muzzle-loaders of the farmer's boys 

 before the sun was clear of the elm tops. They thought, 

 perhaps, the square of wheat was cover enough when the 

 first of the workers came filing up through the lane into the 

 field at six a.m., bolted into it incontinently, and had hardly 

 a misgiving or a guess at how serious affairs were becoming 

 for them until the whish of the scythes grew closer and closer 

 on every side, and yellow daylight came down the furrows 

 that had lain before cool and damp in the green gloom of 

 flowering herbage. Then they made the delayed but unavoid- 

 able rush. Even such humble sport the carnival of the 

 half-shorn corn was good fun. 



Bunny number one was " chopped " by an active lurcher 

 called up from guarding his master's lunch under the hedge 

 to take a share in the sport. Number two might have 

 reached the fern clump he was running for had fortune been 

 kinder. But, alike to heroes contending on Trojan plains 

 and conies delivered over to the sportsman, fate is sometimes 

 cold and forgetful of the brave, and thus he rolled over to a 

 charge of " 6 " to be soon stretched out by his comrade. 

 Number three did get away, because he had the sagacity 

 or good luck to dash close past the worthy farmer's 

 well-legginged legs, and his boy, Master Wurzel, was too 

 dutiful to risk the chance of "peppering the guvnor," though 

 the provocation was great. So the tale went on of the rough 

 game; some rabbits meeting their fate from the guns posted 

 at the fast dr a wing-in corners of the square, and others 

 coming by it in less legitimate fashion. 



After this dusting of the rabbits comes the feast of St.. 

 Partridge, with its hot tramps over bare stubbles in search 

 of " wee brown birds ; " and then the pheasant shooter's 

 chance, the competition for good corners in the pleasant 

 amber-tinted woods, the tipping of authoritative velveteens, 

 and the " heaps of gorgeous slain," as the daily papers have 



