XVI.] HEDGEHOGS. 377 Squirrels are the most delightful of all the furred denizens of the woods. Running up the trees, with their long brushes straight out behind, they are not unlike miniature foxes. The slenderness of the twigs on which they manage to find support is one of the greatest wonders of the woods. The harmless hedgehog, as everybody is aware, rolls himself up into a lifeless ball of bristles on being disturbed. By staying quietly by him and addressing him in an encouraging tone, I lately induced a very large hedgehog to unroll himself and creep slowly along close to my feet. It is very extraordinary how all wild animals, especially when young, can be won by kindness. I once came across a young hedgehog about threeparts grown; he was running about on the grass in front of the house in broad daylight, and kept poking his little nose into the earth searching for emmets and grubs. I made friends with him, dug him up some worms, and in less than half an hour he became as tame as possible. Tom Peregrine, the keeper, stood by and roared with laughter at his antics, saying he had never seen such a "comical job" in all his life. And it really was a curious sight. The hedgehog, with the merriest twinkle in his eyes, would take the worms out of my hand; and when I dangled them five or six inches off the ground, he would rear up on his hindlegs and snatch and grab until he secured them. Then he would sit up and scratch himself like a dog. He would allow me to take him up in my hands and stroke him, and yet not retire into his bristly shell. He ate a dozen worms and a bumble-bee straight off the reel, and then with all the gluttony of the pig tribe he went searching about for more food. I noticed that he ate the grass, in the same way as dogs do, for medicinal purposes. We put him into a large box with some hay in it, and as he still seemed hungry that evening, we gave him a couple of cockchafers from the kitchen, which he appeared to relish mightily. The little fellow was as happy as a king, crying and squeaking whenever we went to look at him, and hunting round the box for food. But, alas! we had overfed him. To our intense regret he died the next day from acute indigestion. There are but few snakes or vipers in the district of which I am writing. But quite recently a man found a large trout about eighteen inches in length lying dead in the Coln, and protruding from the mouth of the fish was a large snake, also dead. The snake must have been swimming in the water (as they are known to do occasionally), and the trout being in a backwater, where food was scarce, must have seized the snake and choked himself in his efforts to bolt it. This was a remarkable occurrence, because a Coln trout is most particular as to his bill of fare, and snakes are certainly not usually included in the list. There is such a plentiful supply of larvæ, caddis, "stone-loach," fresh-water shrimps, crayfish, and other crustaceans, to say nothing of flies, minnows, and small fry, that a trout would very seldom attack a snake. A large lobworm, however, as every one knows, is a very attractive bait for any kind of fresh-water fish except pike. Stoats with reddish-brown backs and yellow bellies XVI.] EVENING ON THE HILLS. 379 may often be seen hunting the rabbits, and the little weasels may sometimes be drawn out of their holes in the walls if one makes a squeaking noise with the lips. Stoats usually hunt singly, weasels in packs and pairs. But we must leave the woods, for the evening shadows are lengthening and the "golden evening brightens in the west." It is time to go up to the cornfields on the hill and see the sun set. I have said that there is no path through this wood; it is sacred to foxes. They are not here now, however; they will not be back till all the corn is cut. The wheatfields are their summer quarters. It is no easy matter to get out of a tangled wood in August. The stinging-nettles are seven feet high in places; we must hold our hands high above our heads and plough our way through them. When we finally emerge we are covered from head to foot with large prickly burrs from the seeding burdocks, as well as with the small round burrs of the goose-grass. Then "On and up where nature's heart As we pass onwards over the cornfields towards a piece of high ground from which it is our wont to watch the sun set, a silvery half-moon peeps out between the clouds. In the north-west the range of limestone hills is already tinged with purple. In the highest heaven are bars of distant cloud, so motionless that they appear to be sailing slowly against the wind. Lower down, dusky, smoke-like clouds, tinged here and there with a rosy hue, are flying rapidly onwards, ever onwards, in the sky. Later on the higher clouds will turn deep red, whilst brighter and brighter will glow the moon. Yonder, twenty-five miles away, the old White Horse is just visible upon the distant chalk downs. Overhead the sky has the deep blue of mazarine, but westwards and south-west the colour is light olive green, gradually changing to an intensely bright yellow. Heavy banks of clouds are slowly rising in the southwest; the bleating of sheep at the ancient homestead half a mile away is the only sound to be heard. As the sun goes down to-night it resembles a great ship on fire amidst the breakers on a rockbound coast; for the western sky is dashed with fleecy clouds, like the spray that beats against the chalk cliffs on the shore of the mighty Atlantic; and amid the last plunges of the doomed vessel the spray is tinged redder and redder, ere with her human cargo she disappears amid the surf. But no But no sooner has she sunk into the abyss than the foam and the fierce breakers die away, and a wondrous calm broods over all things. In twenty minutes' time nothing is left in the western sky but a tiny bar of golden cloud that cannot yet quite die away, reminding me, as I still thought about the burning ship and her ill-fated crew, of "the golden key Which opes the palace of Eternity." But eastwards, above the old legendary White Horse, the "Empress of the Night," serene and proudly pale, is driving her car across the darkening skies. T is in the autumn that life in an old manor house on the Cotswolds has its greatest charm; for one of the chief characteristics of a house in the depths of the country surrounded by a broad manor is the game. The whole atmosphere of such a place savours of rabbits and hares and partridges. There may be no pheasant-rearing and comparatively little game of any kind, yet the place is, nevertheless, associated with sport with the gun. Ten to one there are guns, old and new, hanging up in the hall or the smoking |