From the top a faint rabbit track was, visible
winding downwards to within twenty-four feet of the ground;
the rest was a sheer wall of rock. Down he dashed, faster and
faster as he got to where the track ended, and then losing his
footing he fell swiftly to the earth, but luckily dropped on a
deep spongy turf and was not hurt. After witnessing this
reckless act I knew how he had come by those frightful bruises
on a former occasion. He had doubtless fallen a long way down
a cliff and had been almost crushed on the stones. But the
lesson was lost on Jack; he would have it that where rabbits
and foxes went he could go!
After all, the chief pleasure those blank bad days had for me
was the thought that Jack was as happy as he could well be.
But it was not enough to satisfy me, and by and by it came
into my mind that I had been long enough at that place. It
was hard to leave Jack, who had put himself so entirely in my
hands, and trusted me so implicitly. But - the weather was
keeping very bad: was there ever known such a June as this of
1907? So wet and windy and cold! Then, too, the bloom had
gone from the furze. It was, I remembered, to witness this
chief loveliness that I came. Looking on the wide moor and
far-off boulder-strewn hills and seeing how rusty the bushes
were, I quoted -
The bloom has gone, and with the bloom go I,
and early in the morning, with all my belongings on my back, I
stole softly forth, glancing apprehensively in the direction
of the kennel, and out on to the windy road. It was painful
to me to have to decamp in this way; it made me think meanly
of myself; but if Jack could read this and could speak his
mind I think he would acknowledge that my way of bringing the
connection to an end was best for both of us. I was not the
person, or dog on two legs, he had taken me for, one with a
proper desire to kill things: I only acted according to my
poor lights. Nothing, then, remains to be said except that
one word which it was not convenient to speak on the windy
morning of my departure - Good-bye Jack.
End of Afoot in England, by W.H. Hudson
