i8o THE GAMEKEEPER AT HOME. 



ground till the very latest period in order that they may 

 snare it. 



Much kindly talk has been uttered over allotments, 

 and undoubtedly they are a great encouragement to the 

 labourer ; yet even this advantage is commonly abused. 

 The tenants have no ground of complaint as to damage to 

 their crops, because the keeper, at a word from them, would 

 lose not a moment of time in killing or driving away the 

 intruder ; and as an acknowledgment of honesty and in 

 reparation of the mischief, if any, a couple of rabbits 

 would be presented to the man who carried the complaint. 

 But the labourer, if he spies the tracks of a hare running 

 into his plot of corn, or suspects that a pheasant is hiding 

 there, carefully keeps that knowledge to himself. He 

 knows that a pheasant, if you can get close enough to it 

 before it rises, is a clumsy bird, and large enough to offer 

 a fair mark, and may be brought down with a stout stick 

 dexterously thrown. As very probably the pheasant is 

 a young one and (not yet having undergone its baptism of 

 fire) only recently regularly fed, it is almost tame and may 

 be approached without difficulty. This is why the keeper 

 just looks round the allotment gardens now and then, and 

 lets his dogs run about ; for their noses are much more 

 clever at discovering hidden fur or feathers than his eyes. 



In winter if the weather be severe, hares and rabbits 

 are very bold, and will enter gardens though attached to 

 dwelling-houses. Sometimes when a vast double-mound 



