288 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



snares may be made. Plugs and pegs may be shaped, 

 for holding snares and traps, from a length of solid ash 

 which the keeper knows to be well seasoned, so that it 

 will not crack when he drives it into stony ground 

 with his heavy, steel-shod heel. For months he has 

 treasured that piece of ash and terrible was the 

 vengeance that he vowed on his wife when she dared 

 to hint that it would serve nicely for her copper fire. 



The wet day brings the chance for doing various little 

 carpentering jobs, long neglected. The keeper may 

 have set himself the task of making a new 

 The hand-barrow before the coming of another 



Lumber pheasant-rearing time a barrow for carry- 

 ing the coops, two at a time, with the hen 

 and precious chicks within, where a horse and cart 

 cannot pass through the coverts. Perhaps he remem- 

 bers a day when the crazy handle of the old barrow 

 snapped off and upset two coops of his best birds. 

 Then a wet day is a good day for sorting coops, and 

 putting apart for professional treatment those beyond 

 the keeper's makeshift craft. He can set about 

 painting the whole ones. Now and again he must 

 look to his ferret-hutches, and fit new wire-netting 

 to the fronts if any meshes are rotten with rust 

 should the ferrets escape there is no telling what may 

 happen. And guns are never the worse for an extra 

 special examination, and a thorough cleaning and 



