SHOOTER'S HILL 35 



house, and a piano-organ playing the latest comic 

 song, where {eheii, fugaces .') meads and orchards 

 gladdened his eyes a few short weeks before. 



IX 



As one proceeds through Charlton village, j^ast an 

 oddly-named public-house, " The Sun in the Sands," 

 and the uncharted wilderness of Kidbrook, Shooter's 

 Hill comes into view, and the long line of " villas " ends. 

 Just beyond the seventh milestone from London is 

 another little public-house, the " Fox under the Hill," 

 followed shortly by the " Earl of Moira," overlooked 

 by the great buildings of the new Fever Hospital 

 which the London County Council has set up here, to 

 the disgust of all the dwellers round about. Next to 

 this come the great dismal buildings of the Military 

 Hospital, where soldier-invalids crawl about the 

 courtyards, or, happily convalescent, lean over the 

 balconies, smoking and chatting the hours away. 

 Funerals go frequently hence, for here are always many 

 poor fellows struggling with death, invalided home 

 from the cruel heats of India, and many are the sad 

 little processions that go with slow step and rumbling 

 of gun-carriages to the God's Acres of East Wickham 

 and Plumstead. 



But up among the young oak coppices, the lush 

 grass, and the perennial springs of Shooter's Hill, all is 

 peaceful and pleasant. You can hear the Woolwich 

 bugles sing softly through the summer air ; birds 

 twitter overhead, the robustious crowings of arrogant 

 cocks, the sharp ring of jerry-builders' trowels comes 

 up from below, the winds whisper among the oaks and 

 rustle like the frou-frou of silk through the foliage of 

 the silver-beeches — ^while London toils and moils 

 beyond. Distant smoke drives before the wind in 

 earnest of those metropolitan labours, and kindly 



