Hedging
Among all the crafts of the countryside a fine bit of thatching or hedging pleases me most. A newly thatched rick, when the job is well done, is a most satisfying sight, although, with so many Dutch barns and a habit of piling straw in bales, well-thatched ricks are not so common as they were. My district is hardly ideal hunting-country, and not much care is taken with hedges, but a day or two ago I passed some of the neatest work I have seen for a long time and it was hawthorn throughout. Laying a thorn-hedge is a harder task than splitting and folding hazels, but this hedging was lying as prettily as the more pliable hazel. The heavy trunks had all been half cut, and the tops Ivere even., We passed about a quarter of a mile of the work, and my admiration made me quite forget that the hedges were the same ones I had admired so much last summer when they had been high and heavy with pink-tinted may-blossOm. Here and there the branches and tops were piled ready for burning. Everything will be neat and in order when the sap begins to run again and the thorn buds we used to call bread-and-cheese are breaking once more.
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