BEACONS, traditionally used to signal a threat to the nation, illuminated the Wiltshire skyline as the countryside expressed its solidarity before the weekend's major protest march.

The beacons were lit across the county at 7.30pm on Monday in a symbolic blaze of publicity to launch the Liberty and Livelihood march in London on Sunday.

There were 200 beacons organised by the Countryside Alliance's action team, in Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and Dorset, but many farmers had their own impromptu bonfires.

Each beacon had a rocket and the plan was to launch them in a chain, starting in Scotland at 8.30pm and finishing in the south.

In the excitement beacons across Wiltshire fired their rockets prematurely, flashing red and green light, the colours of the march, across the county.

Motorists alerted Wiltshire Fire Brigade to blazes at Holly Bush Lane, in Pewsey, Long Hollow, in Eddington, Olivers Hill, in Cherhill, and in Clyffe Pypard, near Wootton Bassett but they all turned out to be controlled fires by local farmers, taking part in the beacon campaign.

James Gray, the Shadow Minister for Rural Affairs and MP for North Wiltshire, ignited a rocket at one of the Beaufort Hunt's beacons, at Monument Farm, in Bremhill.

He said: "This beacon and the march is not about hunting, it's about village shops and post offices closing, rural despair, farming, illegal imports of meat and a whole range of other rural issues that the Government is simply ignoring.

"The only thing this Government understands is numbers and muscles.

"The people whose votes I work hardest for are young people in Chippenham's estates.

"And they're all saying to me 'I don't hunt, I don't care about hunting, in fact I think people who hunt are off their rocker, but why should we interfere with their hunting?'"

Organisers of the beacons campaign hoped to involve every hamlet, village, parish and town in the country to rally support and encourage late registrations for the march.

Will Templer, the Countryside Alliance's regional director of Wessex, which includes Wiltshire, Dorset and Gloucester, said 394 coaches and three trains had been booked to carry 21,500 to the march, but many more were expected to travel independently.

Nearly 300,000 people joined a similar march in 1998 but the Countryside Alliance estimates this year's protest will be the biggest peacetime demonstration in British history.

The Countryside Alliance has stressed that the march is not simply a protest against proposals to ban fox hunting.

It claims it is a popular reaction to the spiralling decline in the rural way of life caused by the Government's ignorance and lack of interest in countryside issues.

But while farmers, hauliers, feed merchants, labourers, huntsmen, butchers, blacksmiths and people of different ages and backgrounds will march shoulder to shoulder in London, it is difficult to ignore the influence of the hunt.

Robert Hall's family have been farriers at Oaksey for three generations.

The family business was founded in 1910, but he claims if there were a ban on fox hunting he would lose two thirds of his trade.

Mr Hall shoes horses of all descriptions from ponies to event horses but his livelihood depends on the income he raises from shoeing hunting and point-to-point horses.

Point-to-point horses need to have participated in nine or ten hunts with packs of hounds before they can be raced, which would be prevented by any prohibitive legislation.

Mr Hall, 51, said: "I don't know what Mr Blair's got against the countryside but he's giving it a fair hammering.

"People are marching to protect their livelihood and freedom of rights, we just want to be left alone to get on with what we know best.

"Obviously fox hunting is the big issue but lots of people who don't like fox hunting will be marching too.

"Say fox hunting is banned do you think the antis will leave the fishing or shooting fraternity alone?

"It's not going to stop until we're all vegetarians."