o had been settled in the place for a hundred
years, he suddenly found that "he could not a-bear farming," and took up
his residence as "an independent gentleman" in a comfortable cottage at
the gate of the manor house. Then he started a "sack" business--a trade
which is often adopted in these parts by those who are in want of a
better. The business consists in buying up odds and ends of sacks, and
letting them out on hire at a handsome profit. He was always intensely
fond of shooting and fishing; indeed, the following description which
Sir Roger de Coverley gave the "Spectator" of a "plain country fellow
who rid before them," when they were on their way to the assizes, suits
him exactly. "He is a yeoman of about an hundred pounds a year; and
knocks down a dinner with his gun twice or thrice a week. He would be a
good neighbour if he did not destroy so many partridges: in short, he is
a very sensible man, shoots flying, and has been several times foreman
of the petty jury."

Perhaps with regard to the "shoots flying" the reservation should be
added, that should he have seen a covey of partridges "bathering" in a
ploughed field within convenient distance of a stone wall or thick
fence, he might not have been averse to knocking over a brace for supper
on the ground. And we had almost forgotten to explain that it was for
the manor-house table that he used to knock down a dinner with his gun
twice or thrice a week, and not his own--for, some years ago, he
persuaded the squire to take him into his service as gamekeeper. When we
came to take up our abode at the manor, we found that he was a sort of
standing dish on the place. Such a keen sportsman, it was explained, was
better in our service than kicking his heels about the village and on
his father's farm as an independent gentleman. And so this is how Tom
Peregrine came into our service. For my part I liked the man; he was so
delightfully mysterious. And the place would never have been the same
without him; for he became part and parcel with the trees and the fields
and every living thing. Nor would the woods and the path by the brook
and the breezy wolds ever have been quite the same if his quaint figure
had no longer appeared suddenly there. Many a time was I startled by the
sudden apparition of Tom Peregrine when out shooting on the hill; he
seemed to spring up from the ground like "Herne the Hunter"--

"Shaggy and lean and shrewd. With pointed ears
And tail