In the afternoon, carrying his bag of clothes slung by a stick over his shoulder, he left Taunton behind, presently abandoned the road that went northward to Bridgewater, and proceeded northeastward, traversing charming vales, and arriving at night at a village about half-way between Taunton and Glastonbury. His pack of cards earned his supper and bed, both in the house of a simple-minded blacksmith.
The next day he passed through Glastonbury, pausing to indulge his imagination before the ruined abbey in which Kings Arthur and Edgar were buried, as well as before the rotting cross in the town's centre, and before the Tor of St. Michael on the hill northeast. He fed nothing but his imagination at this place, and hastened on to Wells, where he stayed his stomach further while admiring the magnificent west front of the Gothic Cathedral, the high square tower and ornate exterior of St. Cuthbert's Church, and the other fine old buildings.
At the inn, he found, among other travellers, a party of lesser gentry on whose hands time hung heavily, their business being finished, but themselves being unwilling to set forth on a Friday. Dick soon ingratiated himself with these gentlemen, whose thick and empty heads were already astray with punch, wine, and ale; and he was made not only a sharer of their good cheer, but the sole occupant of the bed of one whom he tried to assist thither but who persisted in sleeping on the floor instead.
Leaving early the next morning, ere his benefactors were awake to eject him as some presuming plebeian who had availed himself of their drunkenness, Dick proceeded northeastward towards Bath, his eyes rejoicing in the beauty of the Mendip hills and the surrounding country.
When he had reached a spot where a short stretch of road before him had a delightfully secluded appearance, by reason of the trees that overarched it, and the varied slopes that rose gently on either hand, those on the left extending in a series of shapely hills to a far western horizon, he began to think of breakfast. A little way ahead, a vine-grown wall, broken by high gate-posts, marked the roadside boundary of a small, sloping park, belonging to a country-seat whose towers and chimneys rose among the trees some distance within. As Dick lay down his bag to rest, there came from a small door in the wall a gamekeeper, who immediately raised the fowling-piece he carried, and fired at a hawk that circled over a copse at Dick's right. The shot missed, and the gamekeeper reloaded. But when he was ready for a second shot, he shouldered his gun, evidently thinking the bird out of range, although it remained over the copse.
"I'll bring that bird down for you, if you let me," called out Dick, on the impulse of the moment, just as if he had been in his own country.
In reply, the gamekeeper stared in amazement. Dick repeated his offer. Then the gamekeeper found words, and wrathfully ordered Dick from the premises, calling him a vagabond, a poacher, and worse. Dick was about to close the fellow's mouth with a blow, when a loud voice, one that shifted between a bellow and a whine, came from the direction of the great gate:
"What's amiss, Perkins? Hold the damned rascal! I'll make a jailbird of him, that I will! What is it, Perkins? Highway robbery? I'll have him up, the next assizes!"
By this time, the speaker, having got out of a coach just as it was being driven through the gate, had come up to where Dick and the gamekeeper stood. He was a large, pot-bellied man, with coarse features, red face, and bloodshot eyes; a man of about forty, showing in his movements a disability due to a dissolute life, and dressed with a richness that did not avail to soften the impression of grossness he produced.
"The rascal had the impudence of offering to shoot that hawk, sir," said the gamekeeper, looking wroth at the outrage.