20 WHITE 



materials at the spot This custom I mention, because I look 

 upon it to be of very remote antiquity. 



NOTES 



1 Statute 9 Geo. I. cap. 22. G. W. 



2 This chase remains unstocked to this day ; the bishop was Dr. 

 Hoadly. G. W. 



8 Deer will attack serpents by jumping on them with all four feet at once, 

 and I have seen sheep serve obnoxious objects in the same way. G. C. D. 



4 For this privilege the owners of that estate used to pay to the king 

 annually seven bushels of oats. G. W. 



5 In the Holt, where a full stock of fallow-deer has been kept up till lately, 

 no sheep are admitted to this day. G. W. 



6 On the Welsh hills these conflagrations continually take place, and are 

 very splendid at night. It is often expedient to burn a patch of gorse or 

 heather for the sake of the sheep ; but when the fire gets beyond control, 

 as it sometimes does, the mischief done is enormous. The conical hill in 

 the Vale of Llangollen, known as Crow Castle, clothed on three sides with 

 fir plantations, once caught fire, and from base to summit was a mass of 

 flames, that lit up the country for miles by night, and shaded the valley 

 with its smoke by day. G. C. D. 



LETTER VIII 



ON the verge of the forest, as it is now circumscribed, are 

 three considerable lakes, two in Oakhanger, of which I have 

 nothing particular to say; and one called Bin's, or Bean's 

 Pond, which is worthy the attention of a naturalist or a sports- 

 man. For, being crowded at the upper end with willows, and 

 with the carex cespitosa, 1 it affords such a safe and pleasing 

 shelter to wild ducks, teals, snipes, etc., that they breed there. 

 In the winter this covert is also frequented by foxes, and some- 

 times by pheasants ; and the bogs produce many curious plants. 

 (For which consult Letter XLI. to Mr. Barrington.) 



By a perambulation of Wolmer Forest and the Holt, made 

 in 1635, and the eleventh year of Charles I. (which now lies 

 before me), it appears that the limits of the former are much 

 circumscribed. For, to say nothing of the farther side, with 

 which I am not so well acquainted, the bounds on this side, in 

 old times, came into Binswood ; and extended to the ditch of 



