fields, but the slope itself is too abrupt for agricultural operations,
and the soil perhaps thin and worthless. It is therefore occupied by a
small plantation. On the opposite side of the road there grows a fine row
of oaks in a hedge, under whose shade the dust takes long to dry when once
damped by a shower. The sportsman who fired stands in the road; the
beaters are above, for they desire the game to fly in a certain direction;
and what with the narrow space between the firs and the oaks, the
spreading boughs, and the uncertainty of the spot where the pheasant would
break cover, it is not surprising that he missed.

The shot, after tearing through the boughs, rises to some height in the
air, and, making a curve, falls of its own weight only, like pattering
hail--and as harmless--upon an aged woman, just then trudging slowly
round the corner. She is a cottager, and has been to fetch the weekly dole
of parish bread that helps to support herself and infirm husband. She
wears a long cloak that nearly sweeps the ground on account of her
much-bowed back, and carries a flag basket full of bread in one hand, and
a bulging umbrella, which answers as a walking stick, in the other. The
poor old body, much startled, but not in the least injured, scuttles back
round the corner, exclaiming, 'Lor! it be Filbard a-shooting: spose a'had
better bide a bit till he ha' done.' She has not long to wait. The young
gentleman standing in the road gets a shot at another cock; this time the
bird flies askew, instead of straight across, and so gives him a better
opportunity. The pheasant falls crash among the nettles and brambles
beside the road. Then a second and older gentleman emerges from the
plantation, and after a time a keeper, who picks up the game.

The party then proceed along the road, and coming round the corner the
great black retriever runs up to the old woman with the most friendly
intentions, but to her intense confusion, for she is just in the act of