The sky is low and grey but the rain does not fall now. A large lake has formed along one side of the sodden paddock from the rain that has fallen, and, as the bull advances along the hedge he raises a bow wave, a surge of water before his bulk, stirred by his massive legs. He is a dreadnought ploughing through the sea.
Remember the horse chestnut trees that grew in Malvern Park and the beauty of the fresh-split green spiked husks and, seen within, the shining chestnut – not a uniform brown but a gradation from almost-black to most russet of browns, gleaming? It is the colour of the great Hereford bull, shades of dark russet against the tones of his head and chest – Isabella white – his head, huge and square, all woolly and fearsome, hunched below his bulking shoulders.
The barberry hedge has ivy growing in it and the bull forces his head through to eat the long green grass on the other side. A dark harrier hawk curls from a tall tree into the sky searching the ground below.
Seven weeks ago the truck came with harsh clanging of metal and frightening shouts and the calves, now nine months old, were driven off and their mothers bellowed and tears ran down their long faces.
Now those mothers wait two paddocks away.
Barnaby McBryde
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