convinced himself that tillage was far more profitable than rabbits.
He ploughed up his warren, and sowed it with corn; but, unluckily, his
attention had been so much taken up by the fishery, the decoy, the
geese, the thistles, and the hopes of the heronry, that he totally
forgot his intention of making the best of all possible ditches round
his plantation. When he went to visit this plantation, he beheld a
miserable spectacle: the rabbits which had strayed beyond their bounds
during the great snow, and those which had been hunted from their
burrows, when the warren was ploughed up, had all taken shelter in this
spot; and these refugees supported themselves, for some months, upon the
bark and roots of the finest young trees.

Marvel's loss was great, but his mortification still greater; for his
cousin Goodenough laughed at him without mercy. Something must be done,
he saw, to retrieve his credit: ad the heronry was his resource.

"What will signify a few trees, more or less," thought he, "or the loss
of a few silver sprigs, or the death of a few geese, or the waste of a
few quills and feathers? My sheep will sell well, my thistles will bring
me up again; and as soon as I have sold my sheep at Partney fair, and
manufactured my thistles, I will set out with my money in my pocket
for Spalding, and make my bargain for the heronry. A plume of herons'
feathers is worth a thousand guineas! My fortune will be made when I get
possession of the Spalding heronry."

So intent was Marvel upon the thoughts of the Spalding heronry, that he
neglected every thing else. About a week before the fair of Partney,
he bethought himself of his sheep, which he had left to the care of a
shepherd boy: he now ordered the boy to drive them home, that he might
see them. Their jackets hung upon them like bags: the poor animals had