204 WAYFARING NOTIONS 



toeing it. I suppose I should grow tired of 

 Newmarket if I lived there ; but it offers rare 

 scope for tramping from village to village, with 

 considerable diversity of country from down-land 

 (it is not my sort of down-land ; still, let that flea 

 stick on the wall, as the mediaeval French so 

 politely put it) to fenland, and from fen to moor 

 and marsh. Villages are plentiful, and in all is 

 good ale, with conversational landlords, given 

 to pets — dogs, jackdaws, jays, rabbits, ravens, 

 bantams, cats, and pigs, most of whose acquaint- 

 ance is purchasable by bribery and corruption in 

 the way of biscuits, nuts, scraps of meat and 

 lettuce leaves, or a carrot or two. The dogs will 

 eat anything down to cold tea-leaves almost, if 

 they see any other creature go for them. Biscuits 

 appeal to all the birds, the pigs, the dogs, the 

 chickens, and the cats. At any rate, if the raven 

 does not want them it will collar its whack rather 

 than let anybody else get it, and the "jacks " are 

 game to take anything within their reach. Even 

 if badly equipped, one ought to draw much 

 pleasure out of Newmarket at this season ; its 

 environs are in places at their very best just when 

 the leaves are almost on their last legs or stalks, 

 and the belts of beeches make you — or, at least, 

 make old Thames men — think of Cliveden Woods, 

 also Cookham, whose variegated horse-chestnut 

 has been broken, at any rate deprived of its 

 stripes. Mind you, Newmarket's belts of beech 

 and Scotch fir want a lot of beating at their best. 

 Supposing you know and care nothing what- 

 ever about the noble animal or the great game. 

 You can still get a good deal out of Newmarket. 

 One July week, my Editor says to me, says he, 

 '' Take a rest. To do this, go to Newmarket as an 



