116 THE FOEESTS OF ENGLAND. 



forest, as few persons would choose to become purchasers 

 subject to such a claim, before it is determined what part 

 they would be obliged to leave for the grantee.' To us it 

 seems that the meaning of the clause relative to boughs 

 and branches could only be to give such boughs and 

 branches as might be left, after taking out all that could 

 be useful for house or shipbuilding. In 1608 there were 

 growing in this forest 13,031 trees fit for the navy, and so 

 many dotard or decayed trees as were computed to contain 

 23,934 loads. In 1635 the timber was valued at 13,247, 

 reckoning the value at 10s per load, underwood and thorns 

 included. In 1783 the total number of oak trees was 

 38,919, measuring 15,142 loads, and 6,119 saplings of one 

 and two feet each, besides beech, ash, and elm timber, 

 valued altogether at 45,862 8s 9d. These were days 

 when it was an important matter to have a good supply of 

 native oak for naval purposes; now, like other British 

 forests, old associations make its principal value, although 

 it still supplies good timber, and will doubtless continue to 

 do so for long years to come. 



" Early in the last century, there were large herds of 

 red deer in Woolmer Forest, and it is said that no less 

 than five hundred head were on one occasion driven before 

 Queen Anne, who diverged from the Portsmouth Road at 

 Liphook to see the sight. The deer were subsequently 

 unconscionably poached by a notorious gang, known as the 

 ' Waltham Blacks ;' and at length, to check the wholsale 

 demoralisation of the neighbourhood, the few remaining 

 were caught alive, and conveyed to Windsor. There is 

 little life to be seen in the Forest now. A few cattle crop 

 the heather, and perhaps the wild-looking inmate of one 

 of the few cottages in the Forest may be encountered, 

 while the ' chip' of the hatchet is heard from one of the 

 plantations. But stillness and loneliness are the prevail- 

 ing characteristics of the scene." 



