BUCKHURST PARK. 107 



between the taller trunks when you come near. The 

 odour of firs is variable ; sometimes it fills the air, some- 

 times it is absent altogether, and doubtless depends 

 upon certain conditions of the atmosphere. A very 

 small pinch of the fresh shoot is pleasant to taste ; these 

 shoots, eaten constantly, were once considered to cure 

 chest disease, and to this day science endeavours by 

 various forms of inhalations from fir products to check 

 that malady. Common rural experience, as with the 

 cow-pox, has often laid the basis of medical treatment. 

 Certain it is that it is extremely pleasant and grateful 

 to breathe the sweet fragrance of the fir deep in the 

 woods, listening to the soft caressing sound of the wind 

 that passes high overhead. The willow-wren sings, but 

 his voice and that of the wind seem to give emphasis to 

 the holy and meditative silence. The mystery of nature 

 and life hover about the columned temple of the forest. 

 The secret is always behind a tree, as of old time it was 

 always behind the pillar of the temple. Still higher, 

 and as the firs cease, and shower and sunshine, wind 

 and dew, can reach the ground unchecked, comes the 

 tufted heath and branched heather of the moorland top. 

 A thousand acres of purple heath sloping southwards to 

 the sun, deep valleys of dark heather ; further slopes 

 beyond of purple, more valleys of heather — the heath 

 shows more in the sunlight, and heather darkens the 

 shadow of the hollows — and so on and on, mile after 

 mile, till the heath-bells seem to end in the sunset. 

 Round and beyond is the immense plain of the air — 

 you feel how limitless the air is at this height, for there 

 is nothing to measure it by. Past the weald lie the 

 South Downs, but they form no boundary, the plain of 

 the air goes over them to the sea and space. 



This wild tract of Ashdown Forest bears much 



