304 STAGHUNTING WITH THE 



of the frost and the sweep of the midwinter 

 wind have crumbled them, and every here and 

 there they lead to impassable stone slides. 

 The hill sheep, in their constant passing and 

 repassing, wear them away, and they work out 

 innumerable small recesses with their feet in 

 which they may lie and obtain some small 

 shelter from the stroke of the wind in cold 

 weather and the attacks of tormenting fiies in 

 the summer solstice. These same shelters occur 

 all over the hills, and are most easily made 

 by the sheep in the peaty ground of the moor. 

 To a horse that is not accustomed to the ways 

 of hill sheep, it often proves alarming to have 

 the little horned animals jump up out of the 

 ground as it were, when he is in the midst 

 of a stretching gallop over the heath and 

 ferns. The flies that trouble the sheep worry 

 the deer incessantly as well, and it is no 

 uncommon sight to see a warrantable stag 

 lying out on some bare hillside, far from the 

 oaken thickets of his hiding place in the 

 sweltering days of June in order that the 

 passing breeze may give him some little respite 

 from his ever attendant cloud of winged 

 tormentors. 



Lying back from Hurlstone Point the 

 beautiful ilex wood of Selworthy clothes the 

 slopes and shoulders of North Hill, and 

 overhangs the fair domain of Holnicote. In 



