stairs, and there, having hustled into his boots, he thought of taking a peep at his garden, over behind the barn. Monty opened the yard door and stepped over a lolling dog, shouting 'Hoy' to the calves that feared him, 'Hoosh' to the pigs that did n't, and nearly spread-eagling a kitten as he avoided the hens that wanted to pick something from his boots.

water

-

Oh, what a spectacle of desolation met his sight in the garden! Misery, mortification, and madness! A long grove of kidney beans, pride of the summer and flushed with unusual pods, lay in wanton ruin, smitten and prostrate; the potato crop its haulms had been strong as bushes and level as was no longer a crop, it was a bed of gall. Surely an elephant had gamboled upon it. Cabbages were torn and gnashed in short, the whole garden had been ravished and put to grief by someone or something or other. But what? No gate was open, there was no gap in the hedge, and beyond the hedge itself there was only a great beech-wood stretching a mile or more. Not another farm for a very long way. How could a cow get in there? Whose cow? And get out again! Damage? Somebody would have to pay for the damage, and pay good and all for the damage. But who? He inquired of Timmy Dogtrees. But that boy never was any good for anything in this mortal world. Not a thing. The only thing he was any good for . . . By the skimmer of Satan, the tomato plants were all smashed too! A score of tomato plants! A hundredweight of tomatoes two hundredweight!

At breakfast Monty stormed and Monty swore, but Mrs. Barlass said she had n't done it. She said it again at noon, too, because Monty was swearing again. Such a form of exchange Monty never excelled in; it left him conversationally confuted, dumb.

Mrs. Barlass the handsome woman she was, with brooches and plump pink fingers! - was then called out to the bar to attend to a butcher who had blown his nose very deliberately and distinctly there, but Mrs. Barlass wanted nothing of him that day, so, 'Good morning, ma'am,' he said.

In came Willie Waugh for a pint or so before she could return to her dinner, and when Monty heard who it was he took Waugh into the garden and showed him the destruction, the greens, the beans, the potatoes, tomatoes, celery, and peas- the whole agglomeration of riot and savagery. Willie Waugh was a sturdy, somewhat dissolute-looking man- but you cannot condemn a man for his appearance, even when he does call a spade a spade. An old conical hat he had on, and an old comical coat with sleeves too long for him, and sometimes his cottage was called The Poacher's Rest.

Willie tilted his conical hat and scratched his gray hair.

"That's a tidy come-up!' he said. 'A cow, I reckon?' Mr. Barlass suggested.

Willie shook his head. 'No. I'll tell you. A deer done that. Two or three, perhaps.'

pointed out the signs, - 'and that's the way it went back, too.'

Well, so Monty went off to interview Lord Camovers's keeper, and the keeper said he could not do anything, but that if Monty ever did see a deer in his garden he was to be sure and shoot it. Mr. Barlass told Willie Waugh of this. 'Righto! We'll lay for him, to-night, eh?' said Willie.

So that night, a beautiful soft smooth night, Monty took his gun and Willie took his, and they crept out into the garden.

They made themselves snug behind two or three trusses of hay, where they could watch the elm tree and be comfortable, with a big jar of beer, devilish near a gallon, and some bread and cheese. But they dared not speak and they dared not smoke, and so, by and by, although it was two or three coats colder, Monty heaved up a sigh and began to snore. Willie nudged him awake. 'Lord, that won't do, Monty!' And he gave him a sup of beer. A lovely night it was, past one o'clock, with stars in the contented heavens, and everything quiet except for the mice in the hedge, and not too dark except for the forest, and that was as black as ever and ever amen. And there was Monty snoring again.

'Give over!' hissed Willie Waugh, 'that deer'd hear you in kingdom come.'

Monty roused up again for a while, and Willie lay with his gun cocked, listening like a man whose hope of eternity depended on his ears. And what did he hear? Nothing. At least, nothing but Monty snoring long trajectory snores, or whirligig snores, snores of anguish and fury and joy, high and low, a terrific diapason.

'So help me Solomon!' groaned Willie, 'I'm off.' And home he went,

'Any plain stranded wire?' 'I got some fencing wire.' "Thass it; thass the very hammer.' 'But what are you thinking of, Willie Waugh?’

'Ha, ho! There's more in my jellyknot than any lawyer ever knew! I waunt about half a chain of it.'

'What you want it for?'
'Or ever will know, Monty!'

'What are you going to do with it?' 'You would n't believe it if I was to tell you, Monty.'

'Well, I'm damned if I believes it if you don't.'

Then Willie told him he was going to set a snare for that deer, just the same as he would set a wire for a rabbit, only bigger. Monty swore. It was foolish. It could n't be done. 'Give me the wire,' said Willie Waugh. And he gave him the wire, and Willie made a loop of this strong wire, the same as he would for a rabbit, but much larger, and set it nice and artful over the hedge by the elm tree just where he fancied the deer would leap, and bound the end of it round the elm tree, with plenty of play on it too, twenty feet or more.

'He won't have it,' commented Monty.

'He will,' said Willie, 'you see!' They set the snare toward evening, and really, Monty began to think, it looked good and reasonable.

'You can snore the lumps out of a flock bed to-night, Monty. Oh my s'elp me, well . . . no more of that canter in the garden. And in the morning, please God, we shall see.' So that's how they left it.

Well, Willie Waugh got up early in the morning, very early he got up, and took his gun and walked across to The Drover. He could n't hear anything when he got to the garden, but he cocked his gun, crept warily to the hedge, and peeped over. And believe it or believe it not, you, but there was a great stag deer lying there among the greenery. Stone dead it was, with the wire taut round its skull. 'Poor creature!' murmured Waugh. It had dashed both its antlers off; it must have gone mad when it felt the thong, for it had been rushing at the tree, gouging out great pieces of the bark. Its horns lay there, and the garden was in a worse cantription than before. But when Willie called and told Monty, Monty was very glad, and he said Willie could have the deer for himself and take it away and make what he could on it.

The day was a Friday, and Willie had a job of work to do, so he could not take the deer away then, but next day he and Monty and Timmy heaved it up into Willie's cart, and away drove Willie to a town half a dozen miles off for to sell it to a butcher. But the butcher would not buy it. Willie went to another, but he would not buy it either. Not a butcher in that town would buy the deer off Willie Waugh. 'Oh dear!' said Willie to the last of them. "That's a tidy come-up. Look here, will you skin it and dress it for me, so I can sell the joints the best I can?' Yes, the butcher said he could do that

for him; but he could not do it that day, being Saturday and a busy day with him; and he could not do it on a Sunday, because it was not fitting; but if Willie would leave the carcass with him he would prepare it and have it ready by Monday midday. "That 'ull do, that 'ull do well.' And Willie drove homeward, thinking over the names of all the folk he could sell a piece to, and calculating that he could make nearly enough out of it to buy the pony a set of harness.

Monday comes, and he drives again to the butcher. By ginger, that was a hot day! He threw off his coat as he jogged along, and he had a pint at The Golden Ball and another at The Load of Fagots. The butcher took him into his killing-shed and showed him the carcass of the deer, beautifully dressed, a fine beast, so fat that you could not see its kidneys. But it was a very queer color all over. Very queer. Already it was black, extraordinarily black. 'Yes,' explained the butcher, 'that's where you were wrong. You should have pouched him and let his innards out. Directly he was dead. That's where you were wrong. Always have the innards out first thing.'

'He smells queer,' commented Willie, as they were laying the deer in the cart. 'Oh, it's good honest meat,' the butcher assured him. Willie covered it up with a clean sack, paid the butcher his dues, and set toward home again. It was so hot that he could not keep from sweating, nohow, and the flies were most cruel; in fact, when he got down at The Dog and Partridge there was a great cloud of flies following his cart, a regular cloud. The landlady of The Dog and Partridge came out to inspect the carcass, but what with its color, its smell, and the flies, she declared that she really could not fancy a portion of it. The same at The Load of Fagots, and the same at The Golden Ball.

Nobody fancied it, and, by the time he arrived at Peck Common, Willie Waugh was of like mind himself, although he was always very hearty with his food.

'It's gone already,' he exclaimed despondently. The flies were like ten hives of bees and swarming on his cart. 'It's too far gone.' They could not put up with it in the house. His wife said, 'Oh dear, no.' 'I shall have to bury it,' sighed Willie, and he tipped the carcass out on the common and covered it with straw and piled fagots upon it. He told his wife to cut off the best portions and boil it for the hens, and for days he offered lumps of it, free, to his neighbors for the same purpose, but they fought shy of it even for that. Dogs had been chivying the remains, and every person that poked his nose into the air of that common observed that there was something about that would be better elsewhere. All except Mother Dogtrees, Timmy's great-aunt. She helped herself to a fairish portion; indeed, you might say that she had a very nice fore-quarter of that deer. 'Come again, Rose, and don't spare it,' said Willie Waugh to her. 'You get on with it.'

Rose Dogtrees had a grateful soul, and she wanted to offset Willie's kindness with a trifle of her own. So one evening when he came across from The Drover after dark he found Mrs. Dogtrees waiting at his house for him. Being a very neat-handed cook, she had baked a nice little pie for supper and had brought it along for him and his wife. 'Heigh up!' he cried. "There was no call for you to do that, Rose. It's very kind of you. Sit down and eat along of us.' And he pulled a large bottle of beer from his pocket. They cut the pie in three. It was a sin to cut such a wonder of a pie, so smart it was, so sweet it was, with a crusty rose on top and four diamond leaves, and

cunning little notches all round the edge. They cut the pie in three and fell to.

'By cram, this is lovely!' cried Willie. 'Crust as light as love, and the meat's like cream.'

'It is, truly,' said Mrs. Waugh. Her name was Ivy. She was a Baxter from Smoorton Comfrey. 'It is indeed.'

'Ha, you like it!' cackled old Mother Dogtrees.

'I could eat this for a fortnight, ma'am, and much obliged to you.'

'No thanks to me,' replied the old woman; 'it's your own meat in it.' 'My meat?' said Willie. "Your venison.'

'My venison?' echoed Willie. 'Yes, that old deer. You gave me a piece last week.'

'But that deer!' He was almost awestruck. 'But God bless us, Rose, it lay out on the common for a week! Thass so. I could n't face it, and no more I could n't stand it! Why, God bless us,' he swallowed a few more ounces, 'it's beautiful! And we bin a-chucking it to the fowls!' 'More fool you!'

"Thass right. Ho, ho! That's right, Rose.'

'Why, it's kings' meat!'

"Thass right. And I never tasted anything so beautiful in my life,' cried Willie, 'never! But I tell ye - I knew he was a good 'un. You could n't see his kidneys for fat. There now. And we bin a-giving it to the hens.'

'I never give mine,' laughed Rose.

'Ah, well, there . . . save me Solomon ... has it all gone, mother?' he asked his wife. Yes, it was all gone now, every bit of it. Might have brought him pounds even now if only people had n't been so foolish and he so hasty. Pounds! That pony's harness was very weak and withering. Still, the hens had fattened. And Monty might stand him something when he heard

'YES, my dear, I tell you, it was a Perfect Moment!'

The lady was moved; more than you would have thought possible in a person of her superb decorum; far too deeply moved to attend to my modest requirements, until the other superbly decorous lady had sufficiently relished the story. A glance put me in my place. I was not a passenger demanding refreshment, I was an inopportune and (I felt) distinctly undersized intruder into the private affairs of two important ladies. Nothing for it but to wait; and anyhow, this was the Great Western Railway: the train was sure to be late. But the story was at its climax. 'Yes! No explanations this time, and no back doors neither not on your life! There they stood, and there was I. "How do you do?" I says; and, my dear, you'd never believe what a sheep he looked. "Caught this time!" I says. And did either of them say a word? Not a single word! It could n't have been better if it had been done on the stage. It was just a Perfect Moment.'

Clearly. Whatever all this was about, there was no mistaking the lady's gusto, especially as it spilled

1 From the Manchester Guardian Weekly Supplement (Independent Liberal daily), December 2

a good quarter of the half-pint she at length slapped down on the bar in front of me. And then the way she tossed my coppers into the till! Clearly, she was still living in that Perfect Moment of hers living in it and reveling in it.

She gave me something to think about. But I had got into my train, and the engine was at full speed, and I was only just becoming aware of my sole fellow traveler, before I realized precisely what it was she had given me to think about. These Perfect Moments, I was saying, these brief, dazzling gleams that come sparkling into our lives and absorb our whole consciousness in a single unquestioning delight, and leave us incalculably enriched with their distinct and shining images, and the remembered sense of what it is to live, though but for an instant, beyond the reach of dissatisfaction what dead stuff life would be without them! And what wretched stuff this whimsical life of ours chooses to fasten on for its Perfect Moments! ""Caught this time!" I says'; the voice of the superbly decorous lady rang in my ears. Oh, she was wholly beyond the reach of dissatisfaction then, I went on. And how many of us