GROUSE MOOES AND DEER FORESTS. 271 



He whispers in the ear of any one who will listen to him that 

 while the squire basks by the glow of Wallsend fires, his 

 good friend the cotter let the winter be never so Siberian 

 must not roam the park and garner the fallen timber that 

 lies rotting there. Why, even water has been misappro- 

 priated, explains the virtuously indignant champion of the 

 rustic, pointing the finger of hatred at hamlets where the 

 village pump has been run dry that great folk may make 

 ponds on their front lawns for foreign wild -fowl ! The shafts 

 in his quiver are many, and he uses them adroitly ; he points 

 to the Irish labourers who swarm across the shallow seas 

 and send down the value of the Englishman's labour even 

 in his own fields. If Home Rule were granted, is one argu- 

 ment among many, these frugal gentry would keep within 

 their own bogs and cotton-grass wastes, and that alone 

 would be a strong advantage. All this hoodwinks the 

 youngest among our hinds. The elders among them, as 

 far as we have observed, are more circumspect in their 

 opinions. They hear without enthusiasm tall talk of abolish- 

 ing game laws and throwing open coverts to general 

 pillage; the more thoughtful know that all the pheasants 

 and partridges in the kingdom would not go twice round 

 amongst our population, or flavour the rustic's evening pottage 

 even for a week. NOT are they in favour of general con- 

 fiscation who live by the judiciously placed capital of land- 

 owners, and the ceaseless need of all classes for corn and beef. 

 What those who stand by the land do need to keep them 

 in the political way they should go, is, firstly, "better 

 times," which no party, alas, can create; and, secondly, the 

 countenance and goodwill of those whom chance has dressed 

 in a little brief authority. A landowner indeed, we strongly 

 feel, and the hind feels too, who lodges his horses better 

 than his husbandmen, and loves his orchids better than those 

 chubby children who are to serve and live by the side of his 

 heir, no more deserves to legislate for his district than he 

 deserves to be honoured in it. 



