16 THE NATURAL HISTORY 



are removed, are of considerable service to neighbourhoods that 

 verge upon them, by furnishing them with peat and turf for their 

 firing ; with fuel for the burning their lime ; and with ashes for 

 their grasses ; and by maintaining their geese and their stock of 

 young cattle at little or no expense. 



The manor-farm of the parish of Greatham has an admitted 

 claim, I see, (by an old record taken from the Tower of London) 

 of turning all live stock on the forest, at proper seasons, bidentibus 

 exceptis. 1 The reason, I presume, why sheep 2 are excluded, is, 

 because, being such close grazers, they would pick out all the 

 finest grasses, and hinder the deer from thriving. 



Though (by statute 4 and 5 W. and Manj, c. 23) " to burn on 

 " any waste, between Candlemas and Midsummer, any grig, ling, 

 " heath and furze, goss or fern, is punishable with whipping and 

 " confinement in the house of correction " ; yet, in this forest, 

 about March or April, according to the dryness of the season, 

 such vast heath-fires are lighted up, that they often get to a 

 masterless head, and, catching the hedges, have sometimes been 

 communicated to the underwoods, woods, and coppices, where 

 great damage has ensued. The plea for these burnings is, that, 

 when the old coat of heath, &c., is consumed, young will sprout 

 up, and afford much tender brouze for cattle ; but, where there 

 is large old furze, the fire, following the roots, consumes the very 

 ground ; so that for hundreds of acres nothing is to be seen but 

 smother and desolation, the whole circuit round looking like the 

 cinders of a volcano ; and, the soil being quite exhausted, no 

 traces of vegetation are to be found for years. These conflagra- 

 tions, as they take place usually with a north-east or east wind, 

 much annoy this village with their smoke, and often alarm the 

 country ; and, once in particular, I remember that a gentleman, 

 who lives beyond Andover, coming to my house, when he got on 

 the downs between that town and Winchester, at twenty-five miles' 

 distance, was surprised much with smoke and a hot smell of fire ; 

 and concluded that Alresford was in flames ; but, when he came 

 to that town, he then had apprehensions for the next village, 

 and so on to the end of his journey. 



On two of the most conspicuous eminences of this forest stand 

 two arbours or bowers, made of the boughs of oaks ; the one called 



1 For this privilege the owner of that estate used to pay to the king annually 

 seven bushels of oats. 



2 In The Holt, where a full stock of fallow-deer has been kept up till lately, no 

 sheep are admitted to this day. 



