A HISTORY OF HAMPSHIRE 



their snouts, either in pursuit of mice or in wantonness after having eaten 

 their fill, would be of very real service in securing the natural regenera- 

 tion of the woods by means of seed. 



With the introduction of fire and the improvement of primitive im- 

 plements, efforts would be made (as can still be observed in many densely 

 wooded, uncivilized parts of the world) to destroy a sufficient portion of 

 the woodlands to permit of primitive agriculture. The chalk soil, deep, 

 fissured, extremely permeable to water, and easily becoming heated through 

 exposure to the sun, would soon lose its virgin fertility and become dete- 

 riorated, when fresh clearances would have to be made for agricultural 

 purposes. And so the clearances would gradually extend till the only 

 woodland tracts remaining would be those actually necessary for the 

 maintenance of the large herds of swine. Once the poor chalk soil 

 became denuded of its covering of tree growth there would be prac- 

 tically no tendency towards spontaneous regeneration of the original 

 woodlands, because even now the successful sowing or replantation of 

 deteriorated chalk soils (or indeed limy soils of any description) is one of 

 the most difficult operations in forestry. When cattle were afterwards 

 kept in addition to swine the cleared spaces abandoned for agriculture 

 would naturally form the open grazing lands of the flocks and herds. 



That the hills were cleared before the more fertile portions of the 

 lower tracts seems probable, because our present observation and our past 

 knowledge of savage, of uncivilized and of semi-civilized forest tribes show 

 that they keep to the hilly country first of all, and only gradually settle 

 down afterwards in the richer agricultural tracts of the valleys and plains. 



Of what the lower stretches of woodland must once have been we 

 can form some idea from the evidence of the submerged forests which 

 fringe our southern coast and give evidence that the chief trees were at 

 one time oak, beech, birch, pine and hazel, while the wild animals com- 

 prised the urus, red deer, roe deer, wild boar and the shorthorned ox. 

 The pine subsequently disappeared from the woodland flora of this part 

 of the country whether as the result of fires, or of attacks of injurious 

 insects, or of epidemics of fungous diseases it is impossible to say and 

 was only reintroduced so recently as 1776 (see p. 454), although it now 

 forms one of the characteristic features of Hampshire scenery and is one 

 of the few kinds of trees really suitable for the great stretches of sandy 

 and gravelly soils. The clay soils of the low tracts being favourable to 

 the growth of oak, this probably covered large areas interrupted here and 

 there by barren peat-bogs and swamps, the whole coast district remaining 

 uncleared and undrained till long after the Teutonic immigration took 

 place. 



We have but little of accurate special information regarding the 

 Hampshire woodlands throughout the times of the Britons and the 

 Romans. But it is reasonable to suppose that during the early centuries 

 of our era they were vast and dense, and had much to do with its political 

 history. The Andredswald, the Weald to the east, the wooded slopes of 

 the Downs, Bearroc, Harewood, the various woods included within the 



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