92 THE FORESTS OF ENGLAND. 



enclosed, known as Windsor Great Park, was of small 

 extent compared with the whole range of the forest. The 

 area of the park was less than 4000 acres, of which 2000 

 were under cultivation ; while the open unenclosed forest 

 amounted to 24,000 acres. Scarce a vestige of the forest 

 is now left, except what has been apportioned to the crown, 

 adjoining the Great Park." 



Norden thus defines the perimeter of the forest in his 

 time (1602). "This forest lyeth in Berkshire, Oxford- 

 shire, Buckinghamshire, and Middlesex. The Tam-is 

 bounds it north, the Loddon weste, Brodforde river and 

 Guldown south, and the Wave river east ;" and according 

 to him the Great Park, which was enclosed with a pale 

 fence, had a circumference of 10 miles, and contained 

 3650 acres, all within the counties of Berks and Surrey, 

 while the open forest contained upwards of 24,000 acres. 



In the summer of 1815, Shelley resided at Bishopsgate 

 Heath on the borders of the forest. Here he enjoyed 

 some months of comparative freedom from those mental 

 and physical sufferings to which his exquisitely delicate 

 organisation subjected him. He spent the greater portion 

 of his time in solitary rambles in the Great Park, from 

 whose glades, we are informed by Mrs. Shelley in her 

 edition of her husband's works, he derived those glowing 

 and vivid pictures of woodland scenery, with which his 

 remarkable poem of Alaslor, or the Spirit of Solitude, 

 (written during his residence in the neighbourhood) 

 abounds. 



The following is one of the most striking ; a picture, 

 the original of which may be found in various parts of 

 Windsor Park and Forest. 



' The noonday sun 



Now shone upon the forest, one vast mass 

 Of mingling shade, whose brown magnificence 

 A narrow vale embosoms. 



The meeting boughs, and implicated leaves 



