Chapter XIX

A Pleasant Day With An Unpleasant Termination

The birds, who, happily for their own peace of mind and personal

comfort, were in blissful ignorance of the preparations which had been

making to astonish them, on the first of September, hailed it, no

doubt, as one of the pleasantest mornings they had seen that season.

Many a young partridge who strutted complacently among the

stubble, with all the finicking coxcombry of youth, and many an older

one who watched his levity out of his little round eye, with the

contemptuous air of a bird of wisdom and experience, alike

unconscious of their approaching doom, basked in the fresh morning

air with lively and blithesome feelings, and a few hours afterwards

were laid low upon the earth. But we grow affecting: let us proceed.

In plain commonplace matter-of-fact, then, it was a fine morning - so

fine that you would scarcely have believed that the few months of an

English summer had yet flown by. Hedges, fields, and trees, hill and

moorland, presented to the eye their ever-varying shades of deep rich

green; scarce a leaf had fallen, scarce a sprinkle of yellow mingled

with the hues of summer, warned you that autumn had begun. The

sky was cloudless; the sun shone out bright and warm; the songs of

birds, the hum of myriads of summer insects, filled the air; and the

cottage gardens, crowded with flowers of every rich and beautiful tint,

sparkled, in the heavy dew, like beds of glittering jewels. Everything

bore the stamp of summer, and none of its beautiful colour had yet

faded from the die.

Such was the morning, when an open carriage, in which were three

Pickwickians (Mr Snodgrass having preferred to remain at home), Mr

Wardle, and Mr Trundle, with Sam Weller on the box beside the

driver, pulled up by a gate at the roadside, before which stood a tall,

raw-boned gamekeeper, and a half-booted, leather-legginged boy, each

bearing a bag of capacious dimensions, and accompanied by a brace

of pointers.

I say,' whispered Mr Winkle to Wardle, as the man let down the steps,

they don't suppose we're going to kill game enough to fill those bags,

do they?'

Fill them!' exclaimed old Wardle. 'Bless you, yes! You shall fill one,

and I the other; and when we've done with them, the pockets of our

shooting-jackets will hold as much more.'

Mr Winkle dismounted without saying anything in reply to this

observation; but he thought within himself, that if the party remained

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