Bog Myrtle & Peat

By mid-October 1943, my grandfather had moved with his squadron to Sicily. Flying spitfires from an airstrip in the shadow of Mount Etna, he led a number of raids into Italy to disrupt troops and supplies as they frantically attempted to eject the Allied invaders. During one of these sorties, he became lost and detached… Continue reading

There isn’t much of Émile Zola to be found on la Beauce these days. The great agricultural plain which lies southwest of Paris served as a backdrop to parts of Zola’s monumental “Rougon-Macquart” cycle, and his novel La Terre struck me like a thunderbolt in its depiction of filth, hardship and peasant life in the 1860s. But times… Continue reading

Before he died, my neighbour showed me where the last lapwing’s nest was laid in the fields beneath his home. Taking a line between ash trees and the end of a blackthorn hedge, he walked me to the very spot where the eggs had been, and I was touched by the care and precision of… Continue reading

Duck came to the pond on the edge of darkness. Mallard whistled overhead, and crowds of early wigeon whooped against a rising segment of moon. It was a calm night and I had never shot that place on a Saturday before. It turns out that Saturday Night’s Alright for Flighting, and the dimmity glen was… Continue reading

There’s truth in so much of what’s said about getting older. But complaints and resignation are broadcast so abundantly by the old that it’s easy to ignore them. They say that time flies, and children grow up so fast; that as the spark and rage of youth declines, pleasure’s found in smaller comforts. These sentiments… Continue reading

Henry Williamson was one of those Tommies who spontaneously crossed the front lines and fraternised with Fritz for a few hours on Christmas Day, 1914. He didn’t take part in the legendary football match which was played on no-man’s-land, but he did chat with German soldiers and was struck by their determined belief that God… Continue reading

Black grouse struck my imagination like an avalanche. Fifteen years ago, I knew the birds only in passing from a pattern of chance encounters and the occasional morning at the leks with my father. Then for reasons I can’t entirely explain, the birds escalated into an obsession. While my interests have broadened over the past… Continue reading

I saw it first. Something shifted in the straw, then it turned and rolled over on itself. My father said it was nothing as he passed; he was carrying pails of water, and the weight made his knuckles crack. Lambs sang in the lamplight, and the sheep drank deeply as they do when they’re milky.… Continue reading

At the outbreak of the Second World War, my grandfather was farming in Tweedsmuir, a few miles south of Edinburgh. Without his widowed mother’s knowledge, he’d been training as a pilot at the weekends, and his call-up papers from 603 (City of Edinburgh) Squadron led to a chilly exchange over dinner. Within a few months,… Continue reading

A bright day fell like an intermission in the rain, and an owl came hunting through it. Not for him the sodden vulgarity of redwings and fieldfares newly fallen from the east; they were easily pleased by the clouds and the wetness of berries. No, he preferred to make his arrival alone in the sunshine,… Continue reading