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sheep are excluded is because, being such close grazers, they would pick out all the finest grasses, and hinder the deer from thriving.1

"to

Though (by statute 4 and 5 W. and Mary, c. 23), burn on any waste, between Candlemas and Midsummer, any grig, ling, heath and furze, goss or fern, is punishable with whipping and confinement in the house of correction;" yet in this forest, about March or April, according to the dryness of the season, such vast heath-fires are lighted up, that they often get to a masterless head, and, catching the hedges, have sometimes been communicated to the underwoods, woods, and coppices, where great damage has ensued.2 The plea for these burnings is, that when the old coat of heath, &c. is consumed, young will sprout up, and afford much tender browze for cattle: but where there is large old furze, the fire, following the roots, consumes the very ground; so that for hundreds of acres nothing is to be seen but smother and desolation, the whole circuit round looking like the cinders of a volcano; and, the soil being quite exhausted, no traces of vegetation are to be found for years. These conflagrations, as they take place usually with a north-east or east wind, much annoy this village with

1 In the Holt, where a full stock of fallow-deer has been kept up till lately, no sheep are admitted to this day.—G. W.

Sheep obtain the first pair of central permanent incisors when about fourteen months old, and are then occasionally referred to by the term bidentes. As remarked by Mr. Yarrell, it is singular that sheep with a single row of incisor teeth pressing against a cartilaginous pad, should be able to bite closer than a horse with a well matched double row of teeth; but it is a well known fact that a horse would be starved on downs where sheep thrive.-ED.

2 In Scotland where the extensive burnings of heath are common, the prohibited months have reference to the preservation of the eggs and young of grouse and other game, as little other inconvenience is apt to ensue when no woods are in the vicinity.

The Rev. J. Mitford has observed that the description of the conflagration arising from the heath-fires here mentioned reminds the scholar of the stubble-burning described in Virgil's Georgics, i. 84, and the commentary on the passage, by the elegant and learned Mr. Holdsworth, p. 52. Compare Virgilii Æn. ii. 304, Ovid. Epist. xv. 9, and Sil. Ital. vii. 365.-ED.

their smoke, and often alarm the country; and once in particular, I remember that a gentleman, who lives beyond Andover, coming to my house, when he got on the downs between that town and Winchester, at twenty-five miles distance, was surprised much with smoke and a hot smell of fire, and concluded that Alresford was in flames; but when he came to that town, he then had apprehensions for the next village, and so on to the end of his journey.

On two of the most conspicuous eminences of this forest stand two arbours or bowers, made of the boughs of oaks; the one called Waldon-lodge, the other Brimstone-lodge : these the keepers renew annually on the feast of St. Barnabas, taking the old materials for a perquisite. The farm called Blackmoor, in this parish, is obliged to find the posts and brushwood for the former; while the farms at Greatham, in rotation, furnish for the latter, and are all enjoined to cut and deliver the materials at the spot. This custom I mention, because I look upon it to be of very remote antiquity.

LETTER VIII.

TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE.

N the verge of the forest, as it is now circumscribed, are three considerable lakes, two in Oakhanger, of which I have nothing particular to say; and one called Bin's or Bean's Pond, which is worthy the attention of a naturalist or a sportsman. For, being crowded at the upper end with willows, and with the Carex cespitosa,1 it affords such a safe and pleasing shelter to wild ducks, teals, snipes, &c. that they breed there. In the winter this covert is also

1 I mean that sort which, rising into tall hassocks, is called by the foresters torrets—a corruption, I suppose, of turrets.-G. W.

frequented by foxes, and sometimes by pheasants; and the bogs produce many curious plants. [For which, consult Letter XLI. to Mr. Barrington.]

By a perambulation of Wolmer Forest and The Holt, made in 1635, and in the eleventh year of Charles the First (which now lies before me), it appears that the limits of the former are much circumscribed. For, to say nothing of the farther side, with which I am not so well acquainted, the bounds on this side, in old times, came into Binswood; and extended to the ditch of Ward le ham Park, in which stands the curious mount called King John's Hill, and Lodge Hill; and to the verge of Hartley Mauduit, called Mauduit-hatch; comprehending also Short-heath, Oakhanger, and Oakwoods; a large district, now private property, though once belonging to the royal domain.2

It is remarkable that the term purlieu is never once mentioned in this long roll of parchment. It contains, besides the perambulation, a rough estimate of the value of the timbers, which were considerable, growing at that time in the district of The Holt; and enumerates the officers, superior and inferior, of those joint forests, for the time being, and their ostensible fees and perquisites. In those days, as at present, there were hardly any trees in Wolmer Forest.

Within the present limits of the forest are three considerable lakes, Hogmer, Cranmer, and Wolmer;* all of

1 This pond has long since been drained, and cattle now graze in its bed. The covert in which wild ducks and foxes formerly abounded has almost entirely disappeared.-ED.

2 In the beginning of the summer (1787), the royal forests of Wolmer and Holt were measured by persons sent down by government.-G. W. Wolmer, with but two enclosures within its precincts, extended over 5,949 acres. The royal forest of The Holt, with its enclosures, was then found to comprehend 2,744 acres.—ED.

3 At the date of the survey referred to in the preceding note, the timber of The Holt was valued at £61,100.-Ed.

4 The name Wolmer is doubtless a corruption of Wolf-mere, or Wolvemere and it is not a little remarkable that the three great meres of that district-Hogmer, Cranmer, and Wolmer-were named after wild animals, which are all now extinct in Britain, namely, the hog, or wild boar, the crane, and the wolf.-ED.

which are stocked with carp, tench, eels, and perch: but the fish do not thrive well, because the water is hungry, and the bottoms are a naked sand.

A circumstance respecting these ponds, though by no means peculiar to them, I cannot pass over in silence; and that is, that instinct by which in summer all the kine, whether oxen, cows, calves, or heifers, retire constantly to the water during the hotter hours; where, being more exempt from flies, and inhaling the coolness of that element, some belly deep, and some only to mid-leg, they ruminate and solace themselves from about ten in the morning till four in the afternoon, and then return to their feeding. During this great proportion of the day they drop much dung, in which insects nestle; and so supply food for the fish, which would be poorly subsisted but from this contingency. Thus Nature, who is a great economist, converts the recreation of one animal to the support of another! Thomson, who was a nice observer of natural occurrences, did not let this pleasing circumstance escape him. says, in his "Summer,"

A various group the herds and flocks compose.
on the grassy bank

Some ruminating lie; while others stand

Half in the flood, and often bending, sip
The circling surface.'

He

Wolmer-pond, so called, I suppose, for eminence sake, is a vast lake for this part of the world, containing, in its whole circumference, 2,646 yards, or very near a mile and a half. The length of the north-west and opposite side is about 704 yards, and the breadth of the south-west end about 456 yards. This measurement, which I caused to be made with good exactness, gives an area of about sixty-six acres, exclusive of a large irregular arm at the north-east corner, which we did not take into the reckoning.

On the face of this expanse of waters, and perfectly secure from fowlers, lie all day long, in the winter season, vast flocks of ducks, teals, and widgeons, of various denominations; where they preen and solace and rest themselves, till towards sunset, when they issue forth in little parties

(for in their natural state they are all birds of the night) to feed in the brooks and meadows; returning again with the dawn of the morning. Had this lake an arm or two more, and were it planted round with thick covert (for now it is perfectly naked), it might make a valuable decoy.1

Yet neither its extent, nor the clearness of its water, nor the resort of various and curious fowls, nor its picturesque groups of cattle, can render this mere so remarkable as the great quantity of coins that were found in its bed about forty years ago. But as such discoveries more properly belong to the antiquities of this place, I shall suppress all particulars for the present, till I enter professedly on my series of Letters respecting the more remote history of this village and district.

LETTER IX.

TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE.

B

of years.

Y way of supplement, I shall trouble you once more on this subject, to inform you that Wolmer, with her sister forest Ayles Holt, alias Alice Holt, as it is called in old records, is held by grant from the crown for a term

2

I The broad expanse of Wolmer Great Pond still affords a safe retreat to flocks of wild-fowl during the winter season; and wild-ducks and teal still breed in the forest; the ducks in the heath, at long distances from the swamp; the teal nearer to the water. But the numbers of both these species are yearly decreasing.-ED.

2 In Rot. Inquisit. de statu forest. in Scaccar. 36 Ed. III. it is called Aisholt. In the same, "Tit. Woolmer & Aisholt Hantisc. Dominus Rex habit unam capellam in haia suâ de Kingesle." "Haia, sepes, sepimentum, parcus: a Gall. haie and haye." Spelman's Glossary. Several additional documents relating to the earlier history of the forests, both that of Wolmer and The Holt, are given in a note to Letter X. of the Antiquities.-G. W.

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