30 AWAKENING OF ENGLAND. 



along a garden path, and knock at a cottage 

 door to ask your way, a forest woman, shy in 

 poise and with the look of a startled hind, may 

 grudgingly articulate a monosyllabic answer. 

 I would warn any one taking this road for the 

 first time of those cottage sirens who intimate 

 that you should keep " straight on," for that 

 is nearly always the way of perdition. All 

 ways are straight on to the rustic mind grown 

 accustomed to one road. 



Yet it would not be an unpleasant thing 

 to become benighted in Savernake Forest in 

 the summer. It is indeed possible for that 

 landless wayfarer, the tramp, to possess 

 Savernake Forest in a more intimate way 

 than does the Marquis who owns it on paper. 

 Think of the regal splendour which envelops 

 a man who is clothed in garments that the 

 wind can whistle through, as he lies asleep in 

 a nve-mile corridor of magnificent overarching 

 beeches ! 



As you emerge from the forest aisle of 

 noble beeches carpeted with purple shadows, 

 you catch your first glimpse of the valley of 

 the Avon. It is a vision of beauty which 

 leaps into view as the eyes traverse miles of 

 rolling, open country, in which downs, with 



