Some of your readers may have enjoyed a childhood, before the war, as I did. They might even have had a collection of birds' eggs as I did.
I was brought up in an Estate house with a healthy respect for the tweedy gentlemen with the twelve bores who were the custodians of the Estate's game birds and other shootable assets.
One day I had been scouring a spring-sown field for peewit nests and had found four with eggs. I had taken one from each nest, three for swaps when a bulky plus-foured figure appeared on the headland . It was the senior gamekeeper. I decided there was no point in running.
Always wary of such an encounter I had prudently concealed the eggs under my cap. I went to meet the authority figure.
"Not been helping yourself to any pheasant eggs?" he enquired gruffly.
I shook my head.
"Partridge maybe?"
Again I shook my head.
"Ach well I’ll just flap your pockets anyway." This he did with considerable vigour. I was clean. He chatted on for a few minutes, then said. "You're not a bad lad." At which point he patted my head. "Now off with you." I turned and ran at top speed. The makings of a four egg omelette streamed down my face.
A cautionary tale, but perhaps small boys no longer collect eggs. I wonder about this.
© Ian Campbell Thomson, 2007