70 IN THE WEALD 
green lane or road. These paths are raised, and 
paved with the same kind of stone that the roofs are 
covered with. Old-time houses they are, divided and 
subdivided by great oak timbers, which are fixed into 
the brick and stone work. Silver-grey the oak is, 
but solid and firm now as when the timbers were first 
placed there. Huge chimney-stacks there are, with 
a large slab of stone on the top of the chimney. Four 
piers are built up to carry the slab, so that square 
openings are all round the tops, giving them a very 
quaint appearance. Wood only was burnt in former 
times, and in some of these old farms wood only is 
used still. I have seen great logs placed on the iron 
dogs. When these were well alight, the stone-paved 
kitchen or living-room, with its great beams crossing 
the ceiling, glowed again. 
This is a land of birds and flowers. The whole of 
the district in the months of April and May, the 
roadside stripes, mile after mile, the hedgerows, copses, 
and the woods, are gay with bloom. In July the 
modest wild flowers such as primroses, blue-bells, 
the wild hyacinths and anemones, and many more 
have given place to the gay flowers of the wild lush- 
tangle, all that grows in moist or dry places. The 
vegetation of dry lands and of the swamps flourishes 
here in the rankest luxuriance. Step off the made 
