nd you only
make us hungry. Everything will be spoiled, mother, and what a pity to
think of! After that I will go to seek for him in the thick of the fog,
like a needle in a hay-band. That is to say, unless you think'--for she
looked very grave about it--'unless you really think, mother, that I
ought to go without dinner.'

'Oh no, John, I never thought that, thank God! Bless Him for my
children's appetites; and what is Uncle Ben to them?'

So we made a very good dinner indeed, though wishing that he could have
some of it, and wondering how much to leave for him; and then, as no
sound of his horse had been heard, I set out with my gun to look for
him.

I followed the track on the side of the hill, from the farm-yard, where
the sledd-marks are--for we have no wheels upon Exmoor yet, nor ever
shall, I suppose; though a dunder-headed man tried it last winter, and
broke his axle piteously, and was nigh to break his neck--and after
that I went all along on the ridge of the rabbit-cleve, with the brook
running thin in the bottom; and then down to the Lynn stream and leaped
it, and so up the hill and the moor beyond. The fog hung close all
around me then, when I turned the crest of the highland, and the gorse
both before and behind me looked like a man crouching down in ambush.
But still there was a good cloud of daylight, being scarce three of the
clock yet, and when a lead of red deer came across, I could tell them
from sheep even now. I was half inclined to shoot at them, for the
children did love venison; but they drooped their heads so, and looked
so faithful, that it seemed hard measure to do it. If one of them had
bolted away, no doubt I had let go at him.

After that I kept on the track, trudging very stoutly, for nigh upon
three miles, and my beard (now beginning to grow at some length) was
full of great drops and prickly, whereat I was very proud. I had not so
much as a dog with me, and the place was unkind and lonesome, and the
rolling clouds very desolate; and now if a wild sheep ran across he was
scared at me as an enemy; and I for my part could not tell the meaning
of the marks on him. We called all this part Gibbet-moor, not being in
our parish; but though there were gibbets enough upon it, most part
of the bodies was gone for the value of the chains, they said, and the
teaching of young chirurgeons. But of all this I had little fear, being
no more a schoolboy now, but a youth well-acquaint with Exmoor, and