ii6 THE DOWNS 



the neighbouring slopes, must live in a magnificence of 

 rural luxury. Those homes of theirs are more like 

 ancient manor houses, and, for all you can see, may 

 have stood there since the civil wars, although in their 

 bright bow-windows, opening on the beds of hardy 

 flowers, they sacrifice to modern tastes and ideas. 

 Round them, embracing perhaps an acre or more of 

 grass and gravel, runs the strong wall of cemented 

 stone, imitating, on a smaller scale, the bastioned 

 enclosure of Pevensey Keep. All looks as if they had 

 been planned to bid defiance to man and time ; as if 

 they had fought a long and successful battle with the 

 elements. The solid house, gabled and mullioned ; 

 the vast massive barns that line the quadrangle and 

 offer shelter to every sheaf of grain ; the very cart- 

 sheds and pigsties look hard and weather beaten. 

 The chimneys, low and square, and strengthened with 

 iron stanchions, give as little hold as may be to the 

 strong blasts they have to wrestle with ; the gnarled 

 stems and limbs of the trees are toned into a grey 

 in happy harmony with the colour of the buildings, 

 and their leaves all have that same yellow tint so 

 invariably characteristic of the downs. Every advantage 

 the ground can give in the way of shelter has been 

 taken. It is seldom we can suppose the winds working 

 their way down into the hollow, but, once down there, 

 it is hard to see how they ever get out again. That, 

 we fancy, is the reason why the foliage of isolated trees 

 is twisted round into the cabbage form, while their 

 stems are stripped so bare and scoured so clean. 



