44 ENGLISH WOODS: A CONTRAST. . 



wildest bit of forest scenery I saw anywhere. I 

 almost imagined myself on the head-waters of the 

 Hudson or the Penobscot. The stillness, the soli- 

 tude, the wild boiling waters, were impressive ; but 

 the woods had no charm ; there were no flowers, no 

 birds ; the sylvan folk had moved away long ago, 

 and their house was cold and inhospitable. I sat a 

 half-hour in their dark nettle-grown halls by the 

 verge of the creek, to see if they were stirring any- 

 where, but they were not. I did, indeed, hear part 

 of a wren's song, and the call of the sandpiper ; but 

 that was all. Not one purely wood voice or sound 

 or odor. But looking into the air a few yards be- 

 low me, there leapt one of those matchless stone 

 bridges, clearing the profound gulf and carrying the 

 road over as securely as if upon the geological strata. 

 It was the bow of art and civilization set against 

 Nature's wildness. In the woods beyond, I came 

 suddenly upon the ruins of an old castle, with great 

 trees growing out of it, and rabbits burrowing be- 

 neath it. One learns that it takes more than a col- 

 lection of trees to make a forest, as we know it in 

 this country. Unless they house that spirit of wild- 

 ness and purity like a temple, they fail to satisfy. In 

 walking to Selborne, I skirted Wolmer Forest, but it 

 had an uninviting look. The Hanger on the hill 

 above Selborne, which remains nearly as it was in 

 White's time, a thrifty forest of beeches, I ex- 

 plored, but found it like the others, without any 

 distinctive woodsy attraction only so much soU 



