WILD LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY. 71 



creasing in width as it diminishes, and gradually dis- 

 appearing. In its broadest part one of them is used 

 as a wagon-track, for which it is admirably adapted, 

 being firm and hard, even smoother than the bottom 

 of the coombe itself. If it were possible to imagine 

 the waters of a tidal river rising and ebbing up and 

 down this hollow, these ledges would form its banks. 

 Their regular shape is certainly remarkable, and they 

 are not confined to this one place. Such steep-sided 

 narrow hollows are found all along the edge of this 

 range of downs, where they slope to the larger valley 

 which stretches out to the horizon. There are at least 

 ten of them in a space of twelve miles, many having 

 similar springs of water and similar terrace-like ledges, 

 more or less perfect. Towards the other extremity 

 of this particular coombe where it widens before 

 opening on the valley the spring spreads and occu- 

 pies a wider channel, beside which there is a strip of 

 osier-bed 



When at the fountain-head, and looking down the 

 current, the end of the coombe westwards away from 

 the hills seems to open to the sky ; for the ground 

 falls rapidly, and the trees hide any trace of human 

 habitation. The silent hills close in the rear, capped 

 by the old fort ; the silent cornfields come to the very 

 edge above ; the silent, steep green walls rise on either 

 hand, so near together that the swallows in the blue 

 atmosphere high overhead only come into sight for a 

 second as they shoot swiftly across. In the evening 

 the red sun, enlarged and bulging as if partly flattened, 



