110 THE NEW FOREST 



since Stuart days. At that date (1903) the accom- 

 modation for my office and for my staff had become 

 impossible. Two very small rooms on the ground 

 floor had to provide space for an enormous accu- 

 mulation of papers in daily use for reference ; for 

 my clerk and a boy and on frequent occasions 

 for my three assistants, and all the men they 

 were paying monthly wages to. The clerical work, 

 owing to that extraordinary passion of the Civil 

 Service for multiplying and multiplying, and 

 multiplying again all papers and returns, mostly 

 saying the same thing three times over, had in- 

 creased to such an extent that my clerk, with a 

 boy assistant, could not compete with it, nor could 

 I do my outdoor business and help him too. The 

 office accommodation was reduced to such a point 

 that any fresh papers that came in had to find 

 their resting-place on the floor. This, of course, 

 doubled the work, for it generally took more time 

 to hunt up off the floor the references required to 

 make a report that might be called for, than 

 to make the report itself when the materials 

 had been gleaned together. It was actually 

 maddening. 



Finally, in the autumn of 1903, my health 

 gave way from worry. I was ordered by my 

 doctor to clear out of England, to do no work 

 of any kind whatever, or take any sort of exer- 



