V /'..rest: its History and its Seen 



keener than anywhere else. Here, on all sides, stretch woods 

 and moors. Here, in the latter end of August, the three 

 heathers, one after another, cover every plain and holt with 

 their crimson glory, mixed with the flashes of the dwarf furze. 

 And a little later the first beech begins to change from yellow to 

 russet-red, and the amber and gold of spring return with the 

 first frost to the oaks, till the great woods of Prior's Acre ;r.ul 

 Daneshill burn with colour ; every gleam of sunshine, and every 

 passing shadow, touching them with fresher and stranger beauty.* 



To the east, about two miles along the Southampton Road, 

 lies the village of Cadenham, famous for its oak, which, like the 

 Glastonbury thorn, buds on Christmas Eve. The popular 

 tradition in the neighbourhood runs, that, as the weather 

 is harder, it shows more leaves, and, refusing the present 

 chronology, only buds on Old Christmas night. As in most 

 things, there is some little truth in the story. Doubtless, in 

 the mild winters which visit Hampshire, the tree shows a few 

 buds, as at that time I have seen others do in various parts 

 of the Forest. Of course, they are all nipped by the very first 

 frost, which, however, seldom happens on the warm south- west 

 coast till the new year. 



Down in the valley to the left of Rufus's Stone rise the 

 woods of the Long Beeches, and Prior's Acre, and Danes- 

 hill or Dean's Hell, where the word Hell (from hdan, to 

 cover) means nothing more than the dark place, like the Hell- 

 becks in Yorkshire.! Beaten paths and walks stretch into 



* The best way to know this part of the Forest, is to go to Stoney- 

 Cross itself, and stay at the inn, once a well-known house in the old posting 

 days, and lately fitted up for visitors. 



f The word, however, is going out of use, and is more generally now 

 Miftcned into hill. We meet with it in the perambulation of the Forest 

 no 



