the lower part of a frond is green and fresh, whilst its upper half is coloured brown and orange and gold.

Our road, as we continue it, takes us through a narrow belt of forest-Oak, Beech, Scotch Fir, and Holly-where the ground is spread with Bracken, and the Heather flowers contrast with rich patches of Tormentil blossom. Emerging from the wood we again enter upon a tract of open forest, and ascend its rising ground. At the highest point of the upland we get a fine prospect, away to the north and north-west, of the undulating surface of the forest. The distant woods are irregularly and picturesquely brokenthe separate masses of dark verdure being thrown up into greater relief by the mistiness which, as we look, is lying in the hollows between the knolls on whose crests the trees are gathered; whilst, over the foreground of the landscape, the spreading expanse of brown Heather is relieved by the dark-green heads of Gorse. Away in the west a great bank of empurpled cloud appears as if it touched the forestal horizon, whilst, stretching along and over the lower clouds, a streak of

fiery crimson marks the place below which the sun is setting.

As we pursue our journey the western sky grows less bright, the empurpled cloud-banks lose the freshness of their colouring, the streaks of crimson fire grow duller. No bird voices are heard near us, the hum of insects has ceased, and profound quiet, which is almost oppressive, seems to settle upon the forest. But suddenly the sound of bells not far distant strikes upon our ears and reminds us, whilst serving to make the previous silence felt, that the forest is no longer what it was, and that villages and enclosureshouse, field, and homestead-now occupy spaces that were once unbroken wood or continuous heath or moorland. Yet no houses are in sight and the ground on either side of our pathway is genuine, open forest. The spreading Heather branches are, in places, encrusted with grey Lichen. Between the sprays of Heather the ground is occupied by dark masses of the green glossy blades of the Fine Heath Grass, intermingled with taller forms of the coarser kinds, whilst from out of the grassy, heathery clusters

flashes the bright gold of the blossoming Dwarf Furze. Tall forms of Bracken from six to ten feet high fringe our path and spread away from us gracefully on either hand. Presently on the open forest our bridle-path divides into two, and we take the right-hand way, and then almost immediately we take another and sharper turning to the right, leaving a Beech wood on our lefthand side and passing by the margin of a forest pool fringed by tall forms of Bracken. Following for some distance a course due west we skirt by a path, through Bracken ten feet high, the entire length of the Wilverley plantation and beyond it look down towards the south-west, into the Holmsley Valley.

Scott used to say that this little valley of Holmsley reminded him of the moorlands of his beloved country, and he greatly admired and was much attached to it. It was doubtless either the scenery of this part of the New Forest-now greatly spoiled by the denudation of trees and by the invasion of the South-Western Railway, whose lines run from east to west across itor the magnificent woodlands that lie in Canterton

6

Glen, away to the north, that suggested to Scott the graphically-descriptive lines in The Poacher.'

'Seek ye yon glades, where the proud Oak o'ertops
Wide-waving seas of Birch and Hazel copse,
Leaving between deserted isles of land,
Where stunted Heath is patch'd with ruddy sand;
And lonely on the waste the Yew is seen,

Or straggling Hollies spread a brighter green.
Here little worn, and winding dark and steep,
Our scarce-marked path descends yon dingle deep.'

Since Scott wrote these lines the New Forest has greatly diminished in splendour-iron roads and screeching engines have invaded its solitudes; proud Oaks' and 'seas of Birch' and many a hazel copse' have gone for ever, and south of the railway a wide extent of enclosures now fills the spaces once occupied by Oak and Birch and Holly. The change in very recent times is very great. We do not expect that unbroken forest should extend from Brockenhurst and Ringwood southwards to the sea; nor that the wolf and wild boar should, as of old, roam over its woods. But many noble Oaks and many a grand old Beech that, though contem

poraries of the Conqueror, might and should have been preserved intact-trees whose very antiquity and hoariness, so to speak, should have protected them-have been recklessly, ruthlessly destroyed.

But gone as is much of the ancient splendour of the primeval woods of this grand old forest, there yet remain remnants of loveliness precious to the teeming population of our busy island and all the more to be loved and prized because they are the finest of the remains of sylvan England and are justly admired for their beauty, their antiquity and their utility-their utility, that is to say, as objects of beauty.

It is the gloaming' as we reach Burley, passing down into the leafy hollow in which the little village is situated. Its straggling houses are almost hidden from view scattered as they seem to be about its undulating, tree-covered meadows, and buried under the shadows of abounding greenery. Here, as elsewhere, cultivation has encroached upon the forest, meadows and ' 'merry (mérise) orchards' being almost mixed with the Oak and Beech and Holly of the woodland wild.