The soil d/nd the coimtryside 101 



farming, and elsewhere it was improved for grazing, and 

 the clay districts, although completely changed, are now 

 more prosperous again. Many of the fields still show 

 the ridges or " lands " in which, when they grew wheat, 

 they were laid up to let the water run away, and many 

 of them keep their old names, but these are the only 

 relics of the old days. The land is not, and never 

 was, very valuable. The roads are wide, and on either 

 side have wide waste strips cut up roughly by horse 

 tracks, cart ruts and ant hills. Bracken, gorse, rushes, 

 thistles and brambles grow there, and you may find 

 many fine blackberries in September. The coarse Aira 

 grass is found with its leaves as rough as files. The 

 villages are often built round greens which serve as the 

 village playground, where the boys and young men 

 now play cricket and football, and their forefathers 

 practised archery, played quoits and other games. On 

 a few village greens the Maypole can still be seen, 

 whilst the stocks in which ofiendera were placed are 

 also left in some places. 



The hedges are often high and straggling, and there 

 are numerous woods and plantations containing much 

 oak. Some of the woods are very ancient and probably 

 form part of the primeval forests that once largely 

 covered England. Epping Forest in Essex, the Forest 

 of Blean and the King's Wood in Kent, have probably 

 never been cultivated land. In the days when ships 

 were made of oak these woods and hedges were very 

 valuable, but now they are of little use as sources of 

 timber. Instead they are valued for quite another 

 reason : they aiFord shelter for foxes and for game 

 birds. The clay districts are and always have been 

 famous for fox hunting ; the Pytchley, Quorn, Belvoir, 



