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entered Winchester College in 1730, took orders and became master of Hyde Abbey school in the same city, and died in 1779. Nyren prints his song in full. This is the heart of it:—
The wickets are pitch'd now, and measur'd the ground, Then they form a large ring, and stand gazing around, Since Ajax fought Hector, in sight of all Troy, No contest was seen with such fear and such joy.
Ye bowlers, take heed, to my precepts attend, On you the whole fate of the game must depend; Spare your vigour at first, nor exert all your strength, But measure each step, and be sure pitch a length.
Ye fieldsmen, look sharp, lest your pains ye beguile; Move close, like an army, in rank and in file, When the ball is return'd, back it sure, for I trow Whole states have been ruin'd by one overthrow.
Ye strikers, observe when the foe shall draw nigh, Mark the bowler advancing with vigilant eye: Your skill all depends upon distance and sight, Stand firm to your scratch, let your bat be upright.

Further west is Loxwood, on the edge of a little-known tract of country, untroubled by railways, the most unfamiliar village in which is perhaps Plaistow. Plaistow is on the road to nowhere and has not its equal for quietude in England. It is a dependency of Kirdford, whence comes the Petworth marble which we see in many Sussex churches. Shillinglee Park, the seat of the Earl of Winterton, is hard by.

From these remote parts one may return to Horsham by way of Warnham, on whose pond Shelley as a boy used to sail his little boat, and where perhaps he gained that love of navigation which never left him and brought about his death. Warnham, always a cricketing village, until lately supplied the Sussex eleven with dashing Lucases; but it does so no more.

STANE STREET

Before passing to the east of Horsham, something ought to be said of one at least of the villages of the south-west, namely, Billingshurst, on Stane Street, once an important station between Regnum and Londinum, or Chichester and London, as we should now say. It has been conjectured that Stane Street (which we first saw at Chichester under the name of East Street, and again as it descended Bignor hill in the guise of a bostel) was constructed by Belinus, a Roman engineer, who gave to the woods through which he had to cut his way in this part of Sussex the name, Billingshurst, and to the gate by which London was entered, Billingsgate.

Billingshurst's place in literature was made by William Cobbett, for it was here that he met the boy in a smock frock who recalled to his mind so many of his deeds of Quixotry. The incident is described in the Rural Rides:—

COBBETT AND THE LITTLE CHAP

"This village is seven miles from Horsham, and I got here to breakfast about seven o'clock. A very pretty village, and a very nice breakfast, in a very neat little parlour of a very decent public-house. The landlady sent her son to get me some cream, and he was just such a chap as I was at his age, and dressed just in the same sort of way, his main garment being a blue smock-frock, faded from wear, and mended with pieces of new stuff, and, of course, not faded. The sight of this smock-frock brought to my recollection many things very dear to me. This boy will, I daresay, perform his part at Billingshurst, or at some place not far from it. If accident had not taken me from a similar scene, how many villains and fools, who have been well teased and tormented, would have slept in peace at night, and have fearlessly swaggered about by day!

Rudgwick

Rudgwick.

"When I look at this little chap—at his smock-frock, his nailed shoes, and his clean, plain, coarse shirt, I ask myself, will anything, I wonder, ever send this chap across the ocean to tackle the base, corrupt, perjured Republican Judges of Pennsylvania? Will this little lively, but, at the same time, simple boy, ever become the terror of villains and hypocrites across the Atlantic? What a chain of strange circumstances there must be to lead this boy to thwart a miscreant tyrant like M'keen, the Chief Justice, and afterwards Governor, of Pennsylvania, and to expose the corruptions of the band of rascals, called a 'Senate and a House of Representatives,' at Harrisburgh, in that state!"

A VILLAGE DISPUTE

Billingshurst church has an interesting ceiling, an early brass (to Thomas and Elizabeth Bartlet), and the record of one of those disputes over pews which add salt to village life and now and then, as we saw at Littlehampton, lead to real trouble. The verger (if he be the same) will tell the story, the best part of which describes the race which was held every Sunday for certain seats in the chancel, and the tactical "packing" of the same by the winning party. In the not very remote past a noble carved chair used to be placed in one of the galleries for the schoolmaster, and there would he sit during service surrounded by his boys.

One returns to Horsham from Billingshurst through Itchingfield, where the new Christ's Hospital has been built in the midst of green fields: a glaring red-brick settlement which the fastidiously urban ghost of Charles Lamb can now surely never visit. "Lamb's House," however, is the name of one of the buildings; and Time the Healer, who can do all things, may mellow the new school into Elian congeniality.

CHAPTER XIII ST. LEONARD'S FOREST

Recollections of the Forest—Leonardslee—Michael Drayton and the iron country—Thomas Fuller on great guns—The serpent of St. Leonard's Forest—The Headless Horseman—Sussex and nightingales.

To the east of Horsham spreads St. Leonard's Forest, that vast tract of moor and preserve which, merging into Tilgate Forest, Balcombe Forest, and Worth Forest, extends a large part of the way to East Grinstead.

Only on foot can we really explore this territory; and a compass as well as a good map is needed if one is to walk with any decision, for there are many conflicting tracks, and many points whence no broad outlook is possible. Remembering old days in St. Leonard's Forest, I recall, in general, the odoriferous damp open spaces of long grass, suddenly lighted upon, over which silver-washed fritillaries flutter; and, in particular, a deserted farm, in whose orchard (it must have been late June) was a spreading tree of white-heart cherries in full bearing. One may easily, even a countryman, I take it, live to a great age and never have the chance of climbing into a white-heart cherry tree and eating one's fill. Certainly I have never done it since; but that day gave me an understanding of blackbirds' temptations that is still stronger than the desire to pull a trigger. The reader must not imagine that St. Leonard's Forest is rich in deserted farms with attractive orchards. I have found no other, and indeed it is notably a place in which the explorer should be accompanied by provisions.

LEONARDSLEE

To take train to Faygate and walk from that spot is the simplest way, although more interesting is it perhaps to come to Faygate at the end of the day, and, gaining permission to climb the Beacon Tower on the hill, in the Holmbush estate, retrace one's steps in vision from its summit. In this case one would walk from Horsham to Lower Beeding, then strike north over Plummer's Plain. This route leads by Coolhurst and through Manning Heath, just beyond which, by following the south, that runs for a mile, one could see Nuthurst. Lower Beeding is not in itself interesting; but close at hand is Leonardslee, the seat of Sir Edmund Loder, which is one of the most satisfying estates in the county. North and south runs a deep ravine, on the one side richly wooded, and on the other, the west, planted with all acclimatisable varieties of Alpine plants and flowering shrubs. The chain of ponds at the bottom of the ravine forms one of the principal sources of the Adur. In an enclosure among the woods the kangaroo has been acclimatised; and beavers are given all law.

North of Plummer's Plain, in a hollow, are two immense ponds, Hammer Pond and Hawkin's Pond, our first reminder that we are in the old iron country. St. Leonard's Forest, and all the forests on this the forest ridge of Sussex, were of course maintained to supply wood with which to feed the furnaces of the iron masters—just as the overflow of these ponds was trained to move the machinery of the hammers for the breaking of the iron stone. The enormous consumption of wood in the iron foundries was a calamity seriously viewed by many observers, among them Michael Drayton, of the Poly Olbion, who was, however, distressed less as a political economist than as the friend of the wood nymphs driven by the encroaching and devastating foundrymen from their native sanctuaries to the inhospitable Downs. Thus he writes, illustrating Lamb's criticism of him that in this work he "has animated hills and streams with life and passion above the dreams of old mythology":—

The daughters of the Weald (That in their heavy breasts had long their griefs concealed), Foreseeing their decay each hour so fast come on, Under the axe's stroke, fetched many a grievous groan. When as the anvil's weight, and hammer's dreadful sound, Even rent the hollow woods and shook the queachy ground; So that the trembling nymphs, oppressed through ghastly fear, Ran madding to the downs, with loose dishevelled hair. The Sylvans that about the neighbouring woods did dwell, Both in the tufty frith and in the mossy fell, Forsook their gloomy bowers, and wandered far abroad, Expelled their quiet seats, and place of their abode, When labouring carts they saw to hold their daily trade, Where they in summer wont to sport them in the shade. "Could we," say they, "suppose that any would us cherish Which suffer every day the holiest things to perish? Or to our daily want to minister supply? These iron times breed none that mind posterity. 'Tis but in vain to tell what we before have been, Or changes of the world that we in time have seen; When, now devising how to spend our wealth with waste, We to the savage swine let fall our larding mast, But now, alas! ourselves we have not to sustain, Nor can our tops suffice to shield our roots from rain. Jove's oak, the warlike ash, veined elm, the softer beech, Short hazel, maple plain, light asp, the bending wych, Tough holly, and smooth birch, must altogether burn; What should the builder serve, supplies the forger's turn, When under public good, base private gain takes hold, And we, poor woful woods, to ruin lastly sold."
GREAT GUNS

We shall learn later more of this old Sussex industry, but here, in the heart of St. Leonard's Forest, I might quote also what another old author, with less invention, says of it. Under the heading of Sussex manufactures, Thomas Fuller writes, in the Worthies, of great guns:—

"It is almost incredible how many are made of the Iron in this County. Count Gondomer well knew their goodness, when of King James he so often begg'd the boon to transport them. A Monke of Mentz (some three hundred years since) is generally reputed the first Founder of them. Surely ingenuity may seem transpos'd, and to have cross'd her hands, when about the same time a Souldier found out Printing; and it is questionable which of the two Inventions hath done more good, or more harm. As for Guns, it cannot be denied, that though most behold them as Instruments of cruelty; partly, because subjecting valour to chance; partly, because Guns give no quarter (which the Sword sometimes doth); yet it will appear that, since their invention, Victory hath not stood so long a Neuter, and

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