here that likewise appear to exceed in size, and to have
the same peculiar brown.

After a while there came the sound of footsteps and a low but cheerful
whistle. The keeper having slaked a thirst very natural on such a sultry
day returned, and re-entered the wood. I had decided that it would be
the best plan to follow in his rear, because then there would be little
chance of crossing his course haphazard, and the dogs would not sniff
any strange footsteps, since the footsteps would not be there till they
had gone by. To hide from the eyes of a man is comparatively easy; but a
dog will detect an unwonted presence in the thickest bush, and run in
and set up a yelping, especially if it is a puppy.

It was not more than forty yards from the barn to the wood: there was no
mound or hedge, but a narrow, deep, and dry watercourse, a surface
drain, ran across. Stooping a little and taking off my hat, I walked in
this, so that the wheat each side rose above me and gave a perfect
shelter. This precaution was necessary, because on the right there rose
a steep Down, from whose summit the level wheat-fields could be easily
surveyed. So near was it that I could distinguish the tracks of the
hares worn in the short grass. But if you take off your hat no one can
distinguish you in a wheat-field, more particularly if your hair is
light: nor even in a hedge.

Where the drain or furrow entered the wood was a wire-netting firmly
fixed, and over it tall pitched palings, sharp at the top. The wood was
enclosed with a thick hawthorn hedge that looked impassable; but the
keeper's footsteps, treading down the hedge-parsley and brushing aside
the 'gicks,' guided me behind a bush where was a very convenient gap.
These signs and the smooth-worn bark of an ash against which it was
needful to push proved that this quiet path was used somewhat
frequently.

Inside the wood the grass and the bluebell leaves--the bloom past and
ripening to seed--so hung over the trail that it was difficult to
follow. It wound about the ash stoles in the most circuitous manner--now
to avoid the thistles, now a bramble thicket, or a hollow filled with
nettles. Then the ash poles were clothed with the glory of the
woodbine--one mass of white and yellow wax-like flowers to a height of
eight or nine feet, and forming a curtain of bloom from branch to
branch.

After awhile I became aware that the trail was approaching the hill. At
the foot it branched; and the question