The Peregrine Falcon 



CHAPTER XXV 



The Temples of the Hills 



"The groves were God's first temples," says the poet; 

 and viewed from the outside no groves are so hke the 

 temples made with hands, Christian or pagan, as the 

 "clumps," as they are commonly called, growing on the 

 chalk hills in Sussex, Hampshire, Wilts, and Dorset. 

 Nature's way is to grow- her larger trees on the lower 

 levels, and it is doubtful that the downs have ever had 

 a forest growth other than the kind which we find on 

 them now, composed mainly of the lesser native trees — 

 hawthorn, blackthorn, holly, juniper, and yews of no 

 great size, mixed with furze, bramble, and wild clematis. 



9(S3 



