The Open Air 



the fences, as, for instance, round the pheasant 

 enclosures, gives much to do. Deer need attention 

 in winter, like cattle; the game has its watchers ; and 

 ferreting lasts for months. So that the forest is not 

 altogether useless from the point of view of work. 

 But in so many hundred acres of trees these labourers 

 are lost to sight, and do not in the least detract from 

 its wild appearance. Indeed, the occasional ring of 

 the axe or the smoke rising from the woodman's fire 

 accentuates the fact that it is a forest. The oaks 

 keep a circle round their base and stand at a majestic 

 distance from each other, so that the wind and the 

 sunshine enter, and their precincts are sweet and 

 pleasant. The elms gather together, rubbing their 

 branches in the gale till the bark is worn off and the 

 boughs die; the shadow is deep under them, and 

 moist, favourable to rank grass and coarse mushrooms. 

 Beneath the ashes, after the first frost, the air is 

 full of the bitterness of their blackened leaves, which 

 have all come down at once. By the beeches there 

 is little underwood, and the hollows are filled ankle- 

 deep with their leaves. From the pines comes a 

 fragrant odour, and thus the character of each group 

 dominates the surrounding ground. The shade is 

 too much for many flowers, which prefer the nooks 

 of hedgerows. If there is no scope for the use of 

 " express " rifles, this southern forest really is a 

 forest and not an open hillside. It is a forest of 

 trees, and there are no woodlands so beautiful and 

 enjoyable as these, where it is possible to be lost 

 a while without fear of serious consequences; where 

 you can walk without stepping up to the waist in a 

 decayed tree-trunk, or floundering in a bog; where 

 neither venomous snake not torturing mosquito causes 

 constant apprehensions and constant irritation. To 



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