Words in connection with the Forest. 181 



room bad been converted into a fuel-bouse, and bis wife bad 

 laid in a stock of provisions. Tlie storm still increased. Tbe 

 straggling bedges were soon covered; and by-and-by tbe woods 

 tbemselves disappeared. After a week's snow, a beavy frost 

 followed. Tbe snow bardened. People went out sbooting, and 

 wberever a breatbing-bole in tbe snow appeared, fired, and nearly 

 always killed a bare.* Tbe snow continued on tbe ground for 

 seven weeks ; and wben it melted, tbe stiffened bodies of borses 

 and deer covered tbe plains. f 



And now for a few of tbe Forest words and expressions, many 

 of wbicb are very peculiar. Take, for instance, tbe term 

 " sbade," wbicb bere bas notbing in common witb tbe sbadows 

 of tbe woods, but means eitber a pool or an open piece of ground, 

 generally on a bill top, wbere tbe cattle in tbe warm weatber 

 collect, or, as tbe pbrase is, "come to sbade," for tbe sake of 

 tbe water in tbe one and tbe breeze in tbe otber. Tbus " Ober 

 Sbade " means notbing more tban Ober pond ; wbilst " Stony 

 Cross Sbade " is a mere turfy plot. At times as many as a 

 bundred cows or borses are collected togetber in one of tliese 

 places, wbere tbe owners, or " Forest marksmen," always first 

 go to look after a strayed animal. Nearly every "Walk" in 

 tbe Forest bas its own " Sbade," called after its own name, and 

 we find tbe term used as far back as a perambulation of tlfe 

 Forest in tbe twenty-second year of diaries II., wbere is men- 

 tioned " tbe Green Sbade of Biericombe or Bircombe." 



It affords a good illustration of bow words grow in tlieir 



* Against tracking hares on the snow and killing them with "dogge or 

 beche bow," was one of the statutes of Henry VIII., made 1523 {Statutes of 

 the liealm, vol. iii., p. 217). 



t In that winter 300 deer were starved to death in Boldrewood Walk 

 Jtnn-nals of the House of Commous, vol. xliv., pp.561, 594. 



181 



