Country mouse champions cartoonists

Country mouse considers the importance of cartoons.

Country mouse, Country Life magazine
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With Mrs Hedges in San Francisco being feted for her Tunworth Cheese, I have been running the home front and it hasn’t gone well. The first day saw Harry and Anna locked out of the house after school, with me still in London. Then, we couldn’t find a protractor for the mock GSCE exam, despite having bought dozens over the years. After these set backs, I made sure that Anna wouldn’t miss her orthodontist appointment on Thursday, making her set an alarm and texting her from the office to remind her—it was a pity, then, that the appointment turned out to be on Friday.

I am, at best, disorganised, but my mind last week had been caught up in the horrific events in France. Some years ago, the former Home Secretary Kenneth Baker, who helped set up the Cartoon Museum, was explaining the importance of cartoons and said that while France was undergoing its revolution, the British cartoonists had our population laughing so much at the failures of our leaders that a bloody uprising was avoided. For a time, it seemed altogether different last week, but then the great marches in Paris and the rest of France triumphed over evil.

Country mouse shoots on Bossington Estate

Country mouse visits Bossington Farm in Hampshire.

Country mouse, Country Life magazine

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Country mouse reflects on 2014

Country mouse reflects on the past year.

Country mouse, Country Life magazine

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Country mouse celebrates Christmas

Country mouse wishes everyone a very happy Christmas.

Country mouse, Country Life magazine

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Country mouse longs for a frost

Country mouse believes we could do with more frosts.

Mark Hedges
Mark grew up in the Cotswolds near Chipping Norton, in a house now owned by Jeremy Clarkson. After graduating from Durham, Mark worked as a gold prospector and at the leading bloodstock auction house Tattersalls, where he started the concept of the breeze-up sale. He now lives in Hampshire with his wife, who runs an award-winning cheese business (handy as Mark admits to particularly enjoying food that has been prepared by someone else), their three children and two terriers.