EOYAL CHASE OF SHIELOT. 47 



tions in connection with Sherwood's sylvan shade, 

 and the many editions of the song of the bold out- 

 law, and of the adventures contained therein. Even 

 the utilitarian philosopher and the ultra radical, 

 fleeing from the stifling atmosphere of the town, 

 and diving for an hour or so into some paternal 

 wood, is inclined, we fancy, to sponge from his 

 memory the bitter things he has said of the owners 

 and of that aristocratic class who usually value and 

 guard them as they do their picture galleries. 

 Thanks to such as these, there is now scarcely a run 

 in the Willey country but brings the sportsman 

 face to face with vestiges of some sylvan memorial 

 Nature or man has planted along the hill and 

 valley sides, memorials renewed again and again, 

 as winter after winter rends the red leaves from the 

 trees : and the man who has not made a pilgrim- 

 age, for sport or otherwise, through these far- 

 reaching sylvan slopes along the valley of the 

 Severn, stretching almost uninterruptedly for seven 

 or eight miles, or through some similar wooded 

 tract, witnessing the sheltered inequalities of the 

 surface, varied by rocky glens and rushy pools — 

 the winter haunt of snipe and woodcock — has 

 missed much that might afibrd him the highest inte- 



