Mark Ash, Knyghtwood, and the Queen's Bower. 83 



at one extremity, and the Eagle Tree at the other ; whilst 



behind us are the young Burley plantations. Here, near the 



Lodge, scattered in some fields, stand the remains of the 



" Twelve Apostles," once enormous oaks, reduced both in 



number and size, with 



" Boughs moss'd with age, 

 And high tops bald with dry antiquity." 



And now, if the reader does not mind the swamps — and if he 

 really wishes to know the Forest, and to see its best scenes, it 

 is useless to mind them — let him make his way across to Mark 

 Ash, the finest beechwood in the Forest, which even on a 

 summer's day is dark at noon. Thence the wood-cutter's track 

 will take him by Barrow's Moor and Knyghtwood, where grows 

 the well-known oak. Here a different scene opens out with 

 broad spaces of heath and fern, where the gladiolus shows its 

 red blossoms among the green leaves of the brake ; whilst on 

 the hill, distinguished by its poplars, stands Ehinefield, with its 

 nursery, and, below, the two woods of Birchen Hat, where the 

 common buzzard yearly breeds. 



Keeping along the main road, which is just before us, 

 nearly as far as the New Forest Gate, we will turn in at 

 Liney Hill Wood, going through the woods of Brinken, and 

 the Queen's Mead, and the Queen's Bower, following the course 

 of the stream. 



Very beautiful is this walk, with its paths which stray down 

 to the water's edge, where the cattle come to drink ; the stream 

 pausing round some oak roots, which pleach the banks, linger- 

 ing in the darkness of the shade, and at last going away with 

 reluctance. 



Few things, of their sort, can equal these lowland Forest 

 streams, the water tinged with the iron of the district, flashing 



M 2 83 



