78 THE PINE AND HEATHER COUNTRY 



once more appears, and finds its final limit, and the 

 perfection of its peculiar beauties, in the pine-woods 

 and cliffs of the great Bournemouth Bay, and by the 

 shores of Branksome and Poole Harbour. In the 

 larger northern position, which may be roughly esti- 

 mated at 120,000 acres, the greater part is already 

 marked with the present or proposed sites for building. 

 From the heights of St. George's Hill to the desolate 

 flats of Fleet, the roofs of the red houses stand thick 

 among the pines, or above the birch and heather. The 

 great common at the back of Hind Head is becoming 

 a mere " hinter-land " to villa-gardens, except where 

 the ground still remains in the hands of one or two 

 owners of vast possessions ; and by the cliffs and chines 

 of Bournemouth, where, in the memory of living men, 

 yachts' crews landed to fetch water from the little 

 " bourne " by a solitary coastguard-station, a population 

 of forty thousand inhabitants is imbedded in the pines, 

 and thinks itself fortunate to secure a place in the 

 groves upon the cliffs, at a price of from 1000 to 

 2000 an acre. 



Bournemouth is the capital city of the new country, 

 though placed at its extreme limit ; there all has been 

 done that money and forethought can accomplish, to 

 anticipate the wants of the new settlers in this sandy 

 Arcadia. The creation of Bournemouth is one of the 

 economic puzzles of the century, quite as remarkable, 

 and hardly less rapid, than the rise of Middlesborough 

 or Barrow-in-Furness ; for its population has gathered 

 not to make money, but to spend it. The greater 



