142 Wild Life in a Southern County. 
yard—the haymakers marching to the fields. For 
the next two hours or so the sounds from the dairy 
are the only interruption of the silence: then come 
the first waggons loaded with hay, jolting and creak- 
ing, the carter’s lads shouting, ‘Woaght!’ to the 
horses as they steer through the gateway and sweep 
round, drawing up under the rick. 
Between eleven and twelve the waggons cease to 
arrive—it is luncheon time: the exact time for 
luncheon varies a quarter of an hour or twenty 
minutes, or more, according to the state of the work. 
Messengers come home for cans of beer, and carry 
out also to the field wooden ‘bottles ’—small barrels 
holding a gallon or two. After a short interval work 
goes on again till nearly four o'clock, when it is 
dinner-time. One or two labourers, deputed by the 
rest and having leave and licence so to do, enter the 
farmhouse garden and pull up bundles of onions, 
lettuces, or radishes—sown over wide areas on purpose 
—and carry them out to the cart-house, or where- 
ever the men may be. If far from home, the women 
often boil a kettle for tea under the hedge, collecting 
dead sticks fallen from the trees. At six o’clock 
work is over: the women are allowed to leave half 
an hour or so previously, that they may prepare their 
husbands’ suppers. 
As the sunset approaches the long broad dusty 
road loses its white glare, and yonder by the hamlet 
a bright glistening banner reflects the level rays of 
