200 HAMPSHIRE DAYS 



prised that I had asked such a question. No wonder. 

 This hill -top common is the most forest -like, the 

 wildest in England, and the most beautiful as well, 

 both in its trees and tangles of all kinds of wild plants 

 that flourish in waste places, and in the prospects 

 which one gets of the surrounding country. Here, 

 seeing the happiness of the boys, I have wished to 

 be a boy again. But one does not think so much of 

 this spot when one comes to know the country round, 

 and finds that Selborne hill is but one of many hills of 

 the same singular and beautiful type, sloping away 

 gently on one side, and presenting a bold, almost pre- 

 cipitous front on the other, in most cases clothed on 

 the steep side with dense beech woods. It is now 

 eight years since I began to form an acquaintance 

 with this east corner of Hampshire, but not until 

 last October (1902) did I know how beautiful it was. 

 From Selborne Hill one sees something of it ; a better 

 sight is obtained from Nore Hill, where one is able 

 to get some idea of the peculiar character of the 

 scenery. It is all wildly irregular, high and low 

 grounds thrown together in a pretty confusion, and 

 the soil everywhere fertile, so that the general effect 

 is of extreme richness. One sees, too, that the human 

 population is sparse, and that it has always been as 

 it is now, and man's work his old irregular fields, 

 and the unkept hedges which, like the thickets on 

 the waste places, are self-planted, and have been self- 

 planted for centuries, and the old deep-winding lanes 



