82 EDITOBIAL NOTES. [Dec, 



purposes, about 560 houses let at rack rents, or at rents that have 

 been lined down from rack rents ; about 5,000 houses that have been 

 built by Crown lessees upon land let upon building leases ; various 

 collieries and other mine works, and numerous small miscellaneous 

 hereditaments.' The revenue derivable from this property in 1875 

 was £327,278. Last year the amount was £367,553. For details of 

 these items and for particulars of the amounts expended in drainage 

 and improvements of Crown lands for the benefit of Crown lessees, 

 as well as for other matters of interest in connection with the subject, 

 we must refer our readers to the report itself. 



In a recently published letter, Mr. Vernon Heath, the well-known 

 photographer, makes some interesting remarks anent the Burnham 

 Beeches. He says, in answer to the question, ' What age are the 

 Burnham Beeches T that nearly every article written on the subject in 

 connection with the recent ceremony of dedication, mentioned the 

 tradition of Burnham Beeches having been pollarded by Cromwell's 

 army, a tradition, in my estimation,' he says, ' as equally without 

 foundation as some other devastations that are ascribed to it. In the 

 poet Gray's letter to Horace Walpole, dated September, 1737, he 

 speaks of these trees as " most venerable Beeches that, like most other 

 ancient people, are always dreaming out their stories to the winds ; 



" And as they bow their hoary tops, relate 

 In murmuring sounds the dai'k decrees of Fate, 

 While visions, as poetic eves avow, 

 Cling to each leaf, and swarm on every bough." 



Clearly Gray is here using the word " venerable " to describe, not the 

 boles merely, but the limbs and boughs. Now let us take some date 

 of the Cromwellian period, say, that of the battle of Worcester, 1650, 

 and it will be seen that between this and Gray's letter there are only 

 87 years, a period insufficient for the pollarded trees to have grown 

 " venerable " limbs. Gray's letter, it will be observed, was written 

 146 years ago. I myself have known Burnham Beeches 46 years, 

 and during this time, in my belief, the boles of the great trees have 

 scarcely in any way changed ; at all events there is no perceptible 

 change, for they were just as much mere shells when I first knew 

 them as they are now. At the time, too, of my early acquaintance 

 with them I remarked, within the hollows of some, formations and 

 characteristics that have to this day in no way altered. Beyond this 

 I used to find out all the very old people of the district, and learnt 

 that, within their knowledge of them, these trees appeared in no way 

 changed ; that they were hollow when they were young, and more 



