All the ponies and colts on the quarter, not only on Dartmoor Forest, but on all the surrounding zone of waste land, are driven from every nook and corner by mounted horsemen and dogs, towards the place of gathering, which is, for the western quarter, Merrivale Bridge. The driving completed, a vast number of ponies and horses of all ages, sizes, colours, and breeds, and men and dogs, are collected together in a state of wild confusion. Then an officer of the Duchy mounts a stone and reads to the assembly a formal document with seals attached to it. That ceremony performed, the owners claim their ponies. Venville tenants carry off theirs without objection; others pay fines. Animals unclaimed are driven off to Dinnabridge Pound, a large walled-in field in the midst of the moor, where they remain till demanded, and if unclaimed are sold by the Duchy.[4] To this day a Drift causes violent altercations; formerly free fights between Venville tenants and those who were outside the Venville parishes were not uncommon, and blood was not infrequently shed. That a Drift should excite a whole neighbourhood to the utmost may be imagined. The dispersion of the horses by the fire on the moor occasioned the Drift at this unusual time of early spring. The morning was windy, clouds large and heavy were lumbering over the sky, turning the moor indigo with their shade, and where the sun shone the grey grass, as yet untinged with spring growth, was white as ashes. On the top of Smerdon stood a gigantic moorsman, with lungs like blacksmith's bellows, blowing a blast through a cow's horn that was heard for miles around. But the yelping of dogs, the shouts of men proclaimed that the whole world was awake and abroad, and needed no horn to call to attention. Men in rough lindsey and frieze coats and leather breeches, high boots, with broad hats, wild-looking as the horses they bestrode, and the hounds that bayed about them, galloped in all directions over the turf, shouting and brandishing their long whips. Colts, ponies of every colour, with long manes and flowing tails, wild as any bred on the prairies, leaped, plunged, raced about, snorting, frightened, and were pursued by dogs and men. Although there was apparent confusion, yet a rude order might be observed. All the men were moved by one common impulse--to drive the horses and ponies inwards, and though these frightened creatures often broke the ring that was forming and careered back to the outer downs whence they had been chased, to be pursued again by a host of dogs and men, yet there was observable a rough chain of drivers concentrating towards a point on the Walla, spanned by a bridge under Mistor.