92 FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 



heather and the already yellowing fern ; the tall and 

 beautiful larches stand graceful in the stillness. Their 

 lines always flow in pleasant curves ; they need no wind 

 to bend them into loveliness of form : so quiet and 

 deserted is the place that the wide highway road is 

 green with vegetation, and the impression of our wheels 

 is the only trace upon them. Looking up, the road — up 

 the hill — it appears green almost from side to side. It 

 is well made and firm, and fit for any traffic ; but a 

 growth of minute weeds has sprung up, and upon these 

 our wheels leave their marks. Of roads that have be- 

 come grass-grown in war-desolated countries we have all 

 read, but this is our own unscathed England. 



The nature of the ancient forest, its quiet and un- 

 trodden silence, adheres to the site. Far down in the 

 valley there is more stirring, and the way is well pulver- 

 ised. In the hollow there is an open space, backed by 

 the old beech trees of the park, dotted with ashes, and 

 in the midst a farmhouse partly timbered. Here by the 

 road-side they point out to you a low mound, at the very 

 edge of the road, which could easily be passed unnoticed 

 as a mere heap of scrapings overgrown with weeds and 

 thistles. On looking closer it appears more regularly 

 shaped ; it is indeed a grave. Of old time an unfortu- 

 nate woman committed suicide, and according to the 

 barbarous law of those days her body was buried at the 

 cross-roads and a stake driven through it. That was the 

 end so far as the brutal law of the land went. But the 

 road-menders, with better hearts, from that day to this 

 have always kept up the mound. However beautiful 

 the day, however beautiful the beech trees and the ashes 

 that stand apart, there is always a melancholy feeling in 

 passing the place. This thistle-grown mound saddens 

 the whole ; it is impossible to forget it ; it lies, as it were, 



