104 WOODLAND, MOOR, AND STREAM 



old fashioned gardens and orchards, the whole sur- 

 rounded by great elms. They have many windows 

 with lead lights ; and porches which would seat a 

 whole family ; walls shut them in, grown over with 

 every coloured lichen, silver grey, pale green, and 

 orange. Ferns and mosses spring from between the 

 stones. The very look of these homesteads brings a 

 feeling of rest and quiet Inside are large rooms with 

 beams across the ceilings, and wainscot panelling runs 

 right up to the top. The doors open with a latch, 

 and passages lead to all manner of strange nooks and 

 corners, and cupboards abound. If you are fortunate 

 enough, as I have sometimes been, to be located in 

 one of these old-time farm-houses, you will feel the 

 blessed rest of a land of sleepy hollow, grateful 

 sometimes after beating along the hard highroads. 



The hedges are a tangled mass of vegetation ; 

 wild clematis, bryony, nightshade, ferns, and grasses. 

 Briars display their red berries ; hawthorn, sloes, and 

 nut-trees complete the show. In a tree just over my 

 head a scolding chatter makes me look up. It pro- 

 ceeds from a family of young squirrels, this year's 

 brood. They have come from the firs on a nutting 

 expedition. Three of them there are, and very 

 comical little fellows they look with their dormouse- 

 like tails, for they are not yet bushy. They stamp, 



