AN. ENGLISH DEER-PARK. 291 
and whether the passers-by are going to the market 
town, or returning to the village, they cannot escape 
observation. If they come from the town, the steep 
descent compels them to walk their horses down it; if 
from the village, they have a hard pull up. So the 
oaken window-seat in the gun-room is as polished and 
smooth as an old saddle; for if the squire is indoors, he 
is certain to be there. He often rests there after half an 
hour’s work on one or other of the guns in the rack ; for, 
though he seldom uses but one, he likes to take the locks 
to pieces upon a little bench which he has fitted up, and 
where he has a vice, tools, a cartridge-loading apparatus, 
and so forth, from which the room acquired its name. 
With the naked eye, however, as the road is half a mile 
distant, it is not possible to distinguish persons, except 
in cases of very pronounced individuality. Nevertheless 
old ‘Ettles, the keeper, always declared that he could 
see a hare run up the down from the park, say a mile 
and a half. This may be true; but in the gun-room 
there is a field-glass, said to have been used at the siege 
of Seringapatam, which the squire can bring to bear 
upon the road in an instant, for from constant use at the 
same focus there is a rim round the tarnished brass. 
No time, therefore, need be lost in trials; it can be 
drawn out to the well-known mark at once. The 
window itself is large, but there is a casement in it,—a 
lesser window,—which can be thrown open with a mere~- 
twist of the thumb on the button, and as it swings open 
it catches itself on a hasp. Then the field-glass exa- 
‘mines the distant wayfarer. 
When people have dwelt for generations in one place 
they come to know the history of their immediate world. 
There was not a waggon that went by without a mean- 
ing to the squire. One perhaps brought a load of wool 
U2 
