112 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



is at pains to place it just so far from a sharp stump 

 that any one tripping will probably break a nose. 

 Anxious for a good night's rest, he keeps a 

 ligllt burning in one of his cottage windows, 

 so that the poachers may think he is out 

 and about ; or when he goes out he pulls down a 

 blind in his bedroom, as if he were sleeping within. 

 Meeting workmen in the lanes near his preserves, 

 he sends his dog for a sniff at their dinner-baskets 

 the dog soon tells him if there is game inside where 

 should be bread and cheese. 



A dreadful idea to the keeper is the thought of cattle 

 in his coverts. The worst that a mad bull could do 



in a china shop would make a faint picture 

 Cattle o jp Destruction beside the havoc wrought by 

 Woods cattle in well-stocked preserves. Happy 



the keeper whose coverts are guarded by 

 good fences in the days when flies torture cattle, 

 and colts are most mischievous. If in hot weather 

 a breach has once been made in a fence by cattle or 

 horses, they will persist in trying to find their way 

 into the woods. One can only pity the pheasant 

 who sits on her eggs, on some sunny bank of a covert 

 fence, while a herd of unbroken cart-colts go lumber- 

 ing round the field, each shouldering each in an ill- 

 judged swerve from the fence. Even in their calm 

 moments colts are inquisitive, and leave nothing 



