yards enough of buffalo-cloth to have eked out the main-sail of a North River sloop; a waistcoat and single-breasted jacket of the same material, with a fur cap, completed his attire; but in his hand he bore a large decanter filled with a pale yellowish liquor, embalming a dense mass of fine and worm-like threads, not very different in appearance from the best vermicelli.
"Come, boys, come--here's your bitters," he exclaimed; and, as if to set the example, filled a big tumbler to the brim, gulped it down as if it had been water, smacked his lips, and incontinently tendered it to Archer, who, to my great amazement, filled himself likewise a more moderate draught, and quaffed it without hesitation.
"That's good, Tom," he said, pausing after the first sip; "that's the best I ever tasted here; how old's that?"
"Five years!" Tom replied: "five years last fall! Daddy Tom made it out my own best apples--take a horn, Mr. Forester," he added, turning to me --"it's first best cider sperrits--better a darned sight than that Scotch stuff you make such an etarnal fuss about, toting it up here every time, as if we'd nothing fit to drink in the country!"
And to my sorrow I did taste it--old apple whiskey, with Lord knows how much snake-root soaked in it for five years! They may talk about gall being bitter; but, by all that's wonderful, there was enough of the amari aliquid in this fonte, to me by no means of leporum, to have given an extra touch of bitterness to all the gall beneath the canopy; and with my mouth puckered up, till it was like anything on earth but a mouth, I set the glass down on the table; and for the next five minutes could do nothing but shake my head to and fro like a Chinese mandarin, amidst the loud and prolonged roars of laughter that burst like thunder claps from the huge jaws of Thomas Draw, and the subdued and half respectful cachinnations of Tim Matlock.
By the time I had got a little better, the black tea was ready, and with thick cream, hot buckwheat cakes, beautiful honey, and--as a stand by-- the still venerable round, we made out a very tolerable meal.
This done, with due deliberation Archer supplied his several pockets with their accustomed load--the clean-punched wads in this--in that the Westley Richards' caps--here a pound horn of powder--there a shot-pouch on Syke's lever principle, with double mouth-piece--in another, screw-driver, nipple-wrench, and the spare cones; and, to make up the tale, dog-whip, dram-bottle, and silk handkerchief in the sixth and last.
"Nothing like method in this world," said Harry, clapping his low-crowned broad-brimmed mohair cap upon his head; "take my word for it. Now, Tim, what have you got in the bag?"
"A bottle of champagne, sur," answered Tim, who was now employed slinging a huge fustian game-bag, with a net-work front, over his right shoulder, to counterbalance two full shot-belts which were already thrown across the other--"a bottle of champagne, sur--a cold roast chicken--t' Cheshire cheese--and t' pilot biscuits. Is your dram-bottle filled wi' t' whiskey, please sur?"
"Aye, aye, Tim. Now let loose the dogs--carry a pair of couples and a leash along with you; and mind you, gentlemen, Tim carries shot for all hands; and luncheon--but each one finds his own powder, caps, &c.; and any one who wants a dram, carries his own--the devil a-one of you gets a sup out of my bottle, or a charge out of my flask! That's right, old Trojan, isn't it?" with a good slap on Tom's broad shoulder.
"Shot! Shot--why Shot! don't you know me, old dog?" cried Tom, as the two setters bounded into the room, joyful at their release--"good dog! good Chase!" feeding them with great lumps of beef.
"Avast! there Tom--have done with that," cried Harry; "you'll have the dogs so full that they can't run."
"Why, how'd you like to hunt all day without your breakfast--hey?"
"Here, lads! here, lads! wh-e-ew!" and followed by his setters, with his gun under his arm, away went Harry; and catching up our pieces likewise, we followed, nothing loth, Tim bringing up the rear with the two spaniels fretting in their couples, and a huge black thorn cudgel, which he had brought, as he informed me, "all t' way from bonny Cawoods."
It was as beautiful a morning as ever lighted sportsmen to their labors. The dew, exhaled already from the long grass, still glittered here and there upon the shrubs and trees, though a soft fresh south-western breeze was shaking it thence momently in bright and rustling showers; the sun, but newly risen, and as yet partially enveloped in the thin gauze-like mists so frequent at that season, was casting shadows, seemingly endless, from every object that intercepted his low rays, and chequering the whole landscape with that play of light and shade, which is the loveliest accessory to a lovely scene; and lovely was the scene, indeed, as e'er was looked upon by painter's or by poet's eye--how then should humble prose do justice to it?
Seated upon the first slope of a gentle hill, midway of the great valley heretofore described, the village looked due south, toward the chains of mountains, which we had crossed on the preceding evening, and which in that direction bounded the landscape. These ridges, cultivated half-way up their swelling sides, which lay mapped out before our eyes in all the various beauty of orchards, yellow stubbles, and rich pastures dotted with sleek and comely cattle, were rendered yet more lovely and romantic, by here and there a woody gorge, or rocky chasm, channeling their smooth flanks, and carrying down their tributary rills, to swell the main stream at their base. Toward these we took our way by the same road which we had followed in an opposite direction on the previous night--but for a short space only--for having crossed the stream, by the same bridge which we had passed on entering the village, Tom Draw pulled down a set of bars to the left, and strode out manfully into the stubble.
"Hold up, good lads!--whe-ew--whewt!" and away went the setters through the moist stubble, heads up and sterns down, like fox-hounds on a breast-high scent, yet under the most perfect discipline; for at the very first note of Harry's whistle, even when racing at the top of their pace, they would turn simultaneously, alter their course, cross each other at right angles, and quarter the whole field, leaving no foot of ground unbeaten.
No game, however, in this instance, rewarded their exertions; and on we went across a meadow, and two other stubbles, with the like result. But now we crossed a gentle hill, and, at its base, came on a level tract, containing at the most ten acres of marsh land, overgrown with high coarse grass and flags. Beyond this, on the right, was a steep rocky hillock, covered with tall and thrifty timber of some thirty years' growth, but wholly free from under-wood. Along the left-hand fence ran a thick belt of underwood, sumac and birch, with a few young oak trees interspersed; but in the middle of the swampy level, covering at most some five or six acres, was a dense circular thicket composed of every sort of thorny bush and shrub, matted with cat-briers and wild vines, and overshadowed by a clump of tall and leafy ashes, which had not as yet lost one atom of their foliage, although the underwood beneath them was quite sere and leafless.
"Now then," cried Harry, "this is the 'Squire's swamp-hole!' Now for a dozen cock! hey, Tom? Here, couple up the setters, Tim; and let the spaniels loose. Now Flash! now Dan! down charge, you little villains!" and the well broke brutes dropped on the instant. "How must we beat this cursed hole?"
"You must go through the very thick of it, consarn you!" exclaimed Tom; "at your old work already, hey? trying to shirk at first!"
"Don't swear so! you old reprobate! I know my place, depend on it," cried Archer; "but what to do with the rest of you!--there's the rub!"
"Not a bit of it," cried Tom--"here, Yorkshire--Ducklegs--here, what's your name--get away you with those big dogs--atwixt the swamp-hole, and the brush there by the fence, and look out that you mark every bird to an inch! You, Mr. Forester, go in there, under that butter-nut; you'll find a blind track there, right through the brush--keep that 'twixt Tim and Mr. Archer; and keep your eyes skinned, do! there'll be a cock up before you're ten yards in. Archer, you'll go right through, and I'll … "
"You'll keep well forward on the right--and mind that no bird crosses to the hill; we never get them, if they once get over. All right! In with you now! Steady, Flash! steady! hie up, Dan!" and in a moment Harry was out of sight among the brush-wood, though his progress might be traced by the continual crackling of the thick underwood.
Scarce had I passed the butter-nut, when, even as Torn had said, up flapped a woodcock scarcely ten yards before me,