"Where?" said parson and squire excitedly.
"There," said Peregrine, "over agin Smoke Acre."
"By jabbers, so it be!" said the parson. "Now look thee here, Joe Peregrine, go thee to the sexton and tell 'un to ring the church bells for the folks to come for a fox; and be sure and tell the churchwardens."
"Ah!" said the poet, almost as excited as the rest of the party,
"'And do not stand on quillets how to slay him:
Be it by gins, by snares, by subtlety,
Sleeping or waking, 'tis no matter how,
So he be dead.'" [38]
[38] 2 Henry VI., III. i.
Thus abruptly ended this hawking expedition on the Cotswolds; for the whole party made off to the manor house to fetch guns, spades, pickaxes, and dogs, as was the custom in those days, when a "lanky, villainous fox" was viewed.
As for Shakespeare, after bidding adieu to the old squire, and thanking him for his hospitality, he mounted his game little Irish hobby and steered his course due northward for Stow-on-the-Wold. His track lay along the old Fossway, a road infested in those days by murderous highwaymen; yet, unarmed and unattended, unknown and unappreciated, did that mighty man of genius set cheerfully out on his long and solitary way.