RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32384, 25 August 1970, Page 22

RANDOM REMINDER

THE LAST ROUND-UP

Contrary to the views of many townspeople, the average farmer does not spend his working hours driving about his property in an enormous new car, occasionally acknowledging the workers who stand, knuckles to foreheads, to watch him pass. It is very seldom like that. Much more typical of the farmer’s weary life was the experience of a Canterbury man recently: and he was not the only member of the farm community to be disturbed by it all. Farmer A came back from the far fields

to discover that there was a boar on the road, taking much too much interest in his pigs. The boar belonged to a neighbour, and with some difficulty he chased it back to its rightful domain. In the middle of that very night, with the frost white upon the ground there was a tremendous disturbance in his yard and in the hard moonlight there was the unmistakeable figure of the boar. By daylight, chasing boars back to their rightful owners is by no means a rewarding task.

On a frosty night, it taxes the patience. It took the farmer the best part of an hour to pursue the stubborn beast back to the farm of Farmer B. At breakfast next day, he was able to hold his family enthralled with his studied observations on the obstinancy of boars. When his discourse was ended he went outside. This yielded to him a full if not satisfying explanation of why it had been such a job to drive the boar away. He could see that his neighbour now had two boars.