This morning I scanned three more of Charles Keeping’s excellent illustrations to ‘Our Mutual Friend’.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img20210911_11170113.jpg)
‘Conveniently elevated above the level of the living, were the dead’
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img20210911_11020602.jpg)
‘Tippins the divine’
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img20210911_11062214.jpg)
The artist’s inspired evocation of Dickens’s ‘The whole metropolis was a heap of vapour charged with muffled sound of wheels’ prompted me to post https://derrickjknight.com/2021/09/11/a-knights-tale-32-the-great-smog/
On a still sultry afternoon we took a drive around the forest.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4031-1.jpg)
Dumped beside the entrance to the paddock on Braggers Lane was a burnt out Daihatsu Fourtrak.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4020.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4022.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4023.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4024.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4026.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4027.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4025.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4029.jpg)
Whoever left it there did not destroy the number plate.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4032.jpg)
Looking over the landscape at Rockford End. we could see a sunlit distant marina.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4033.jpg)
Jackie parked beside the very narrow lane while I wandered about with my camera and photographed
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4034.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4035.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4036.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4038.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4039.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4040.jpg)
a grassy verge; tumbling farm buildings in an overgrown field; a dappled bank; and a gate into a similar field
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4045.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4047.jpg)
From the lane up to Gorley Common and Hyde we observed a basking herd of deer.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4057.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4055.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4059.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4062.jpg)
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4056.jpg)
At the top of the hill ponies shared the pasturage with cattle. One pony found its tail in a tangle; one cow stopped the traffic.
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4063.jpg)
At North Gorley three donkeys were employed clipping a hedge, and
![](https://derrickjknight.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/img_4064.jpg)
a huntsman and hound took note of the wind direction.
This evening we dined on Jackie’s wholesome cottage pie; crunchy carrots; tender cabbage and runner beans, with meaty gravy. The Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden and I drank Cepa Lebrel Gran Reserva Rioja 2011.