Skewbald, the New Forest Pony

by Allen W. Seaby

Then rain came at last, and the mare crossed the river again and led her party into the woods. They wandered through the glade of the Queen Bower, with its great beeches, crossed the Blackwater, and so into the thick woods of Vinney Ridge. Here they had a fright one midday, for the baying of hounds, tootling of horns, and tramping of hoofs dismayed all but the old mare, who had often ridden with the buck-hounds. She led her party, which were inclined to scatter, down a drive away from the noise. Later in the week the rain ceased, and leaving the woods, they crossed the Ober and slowly climbed the hill to Wilverley Post, the young foals even daring to rub themselves against the “Naked Man”—a dead tree reduced to a bare trunk and a couple of armlike branches stretched out imploringly. Here they crossed the black tarred road between Southampton and Bournemouth. It was Sunday afternoon and the cars were almost in procession, so numerous were they, the noisy little sidecar predominating; but the ponies took small account of wheels. Horns might blow and chauffeurs curse, but the mares, and especially the foals, were not to be hurried. As the herd crossed head to tail, so that there was not room for even a motor-cycle to pass, the road looked like Piccadilly at its narrowest part, when the policemen stop the traffic. All sorts of cars were there, from Fords to a Rolls-Royce; great charabancs full of trippers, who threw crumpled paper balls at the ponies to hurry them up, but without avail, and the drivers, remembering the warning signs put up by the R.S.P.C.A., had to curb their impatience until the last foal had crossed.

The ponies spread themselves over Clay Hill, went down into the bottoms and up by the steep road from Holmsley Station into Burley, and drank at the pond fringed with hollies, on the golf-links, where one Christmas the scarlet berries hid the leaves, as the golfers, if they notice such things, can testify.

They cropped the lawn outside the school, until the noise of the children coming out sent them into the woods. They missed Burley, fortunately, for one of the old forest pounds stands close by, crossed the road at Vereley, passed the gipsy encampment, and then reaching another black road leading to Ringwood, spread out over the open ground of Picket Post, one of the finest spots in the forest, because of its altitude and its views towards the sea. Here one can see clearly the flanks of the forest hills rising from the level bottom like hills out of a lake. The ponies munched the sweet grass on the lawn with its beautiful little tumulus crowned with hollies, but unfortunately dwarfed by the great modern house close by.

Then the unsatisfied maternal instincts of the old mare surged up within her, an irresistible impulse to action, and she did what horses, dogs, and other animals will do—set her face towards her birthplace. She had been born at Brook, and old memories of her present surroundings may have suggested to her the route to the village. At any rate, the herd were soon travelling slowly to the north-east. Over Handy Cross Plain they went, through King’s Garden and so to Stoney Cross, where, from the hill leading down to the dell of the Rufus Stone, one gets the fine view across to Brook and beyond.

The mare wandered about several days visiting the haunts of her youth; then again her loss came upon her, and she started off across country, for the spot where last she had seen her foal.

All this time the wanderings of the ponies had not been unnoted. People owning ponies had seen them here and there, and in passing a friend’s house would call and remark, “I saw your chestnut mare over by Castle Malwood the other day,” or the owner of Skewbald might be greeted with, “Your four-year-old seems a bit of a wanderer.” If the herd strayed on to a public road where the agisters might catch them, and involve their owners in expense, a forest man would spend a little time chivying them back into the forest. So they had committed no damage in their fleeting disappearances from the forest proper. They had not been impounded, and apparently they were free as air, yet the owner of any pony there, with a little trouble and inquiry, could ascertain its whereabouts and could get it either personally or by deputy.

The herd came back over Emery Down, the great gaps in its wooded sides showing where the Canadian gangs had cleared the timber during the war. Cleared it in a lazy way, the forest men remarked, for instead of bending to cut the tree at its base, they had left many stumps waist-high. But then, timber is cheap in the West.

Missing Lyndhurst, by devious ways the ponies came out on the golf-links, where a yearling got a smack on the flank from the ball of an impatient golfer. They crossed the road, and tried the sweet grass of Pondhead. It was a bright Saturday afternoon, and a boy with a camera, catching sight of Skewbald, tried for a snapshot. He stalked him backwards and forwards, manœuvring for a good pose and lighting, until the stallion got suspicious and annoyed. Disdaining the bridge, he jumped the streamlet, mounted the hill a few paces, and called loudly. The mares, not unmindful of the intruder with his flashing camera, understood. Without undue haste they gathered their foals, crossed the little bridge and took the path up the hill, Skewbald standing sentinel until he saw they were all on the move, then, pressing forward, he overtook the head of the column, and led the way.

Soon there was a quarter of a mile of ponies of all colours, following the meanderings of the path, the mares with lowered heads, foals trotting to left and right. Last of all went an old white mare with a black sucker silhouetted against her side. It was a pretty picture. Even in the distance the energetic action of Skewbald could be noted; his tossing mane proclaimed him the leader. It was a picture, and the boy could not help snapping it, although he knew the distance was too great.

The old mare no longer led the way, for the herd had reached its home pasturage. Indeed, Skewbald’s owner had already noted his return. The ponies crossed the road looking down on Longwater, and passed a night among the lush bottoms. The next day they wandered eastwards over Matley Heath. As they approached the railway embankment to cross under the forest viaduct, they passed an area of a few acres, which would have looked strangely familiar to millions of men of military age. During the war the trench mortar force had used the place as a training-ground, and at every few yards a hole gaped, several feet across and a yard deep.