172 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



This free and easy sport which the cutting of the corn 

 provides for a mixed and excited crowd makes a 



scene very familiar in any English country - 

 The side. The driver of the binder, as he is 



Leave carried round and round the cornfield, in 



ever-narrowing circles, gains a good view of 

 the rabbits and the game, stealing about in their 

 fear ; and now and again he may be observed to 

 dismount to club a rabbit with his whip-handle. 

 On farms where the rabbits are considered the 

 natural rights of the harvesters, old hands grow 

 very cunning at making the most of their chance 

 when the last few yards of standing corn remain 

 to be cut, and the rabbits, with which the little strip 

 of cover is seething, at last bolt out, to be fallen upon 

 by the men in waiting, and to be slain as fast as sticks 

 can rain blows. Rabbits remain in their sanctuary 

 of corn long after the fox has stolen away, and the 

 pheasants, rats, stoats, and weasels have followed 

 after. 



It is a matter of importance that the woodland rides 

 shall be trimmed before harvest-time, so that the 



woods may be sanctuaries to the corn's 

 Woods ev i cte d creatures. On many shoots this 



trimming is left to a woodman ; he may be 

 responsible for all such work over a large estate 

 let to various tenants. As a consequence, the rides 

 of some of the woods are likely to remain untrimmed 



