30 



A Visit to the Forest of Arques. 



By Harry Moore, F.E.S. Read November 13//^, 1902. 



For the past year or two business has prevented me having any- 

 thing like an extended hoUday. During my previous cyding tours I 

 had seen many spots where I should have liked to linger a day or 

 two, and had mentally resolved to revisit them when opportunity 

 allowed. One of those spots was the Foret d' Arques. A few days' 

 leave in midsummer had never been my lot, so when the first Coro- 

 nation holidays were arranged, and the weather being fine, the 

 chance was too good and the temptation too great to let slip. 



The Forest is easy of access, just outside our own doors, as it 

 were. Leaving London by the 9 p.m. train on June 25th, by the 

 same hour next morning I had had five hours in bed at Dieppe — all 

 the more appreciated as the Channel passage had not been quite 

 comfortable. The forest is situated about four miles inland from 

 Dieppe ; it occupies the crest of a range of chalk hills, a sort of 

 plateau, for about another four miles. It covers an area of some 

 2500 acres, and at its highest point is about 400 feet above sea level. 



The trees are chiefly beech, but along the outskirts, the roadsides, 

 and forest paths is to be found the usual diversity of woodland and 

 copse, with just a little touch of moorland here and there. There 

 are two direct roads through the forest, but drives radiate from four 

 or more centres. In these cross-roads and forest paths one may 

 wander all day without seeing a soul. Directing posts are to be 

 found wherever required, but sign-posts are wanting, so that one has 

 to make his way down to some village in the valley for whatever 

 refreshment he may require. There are a good many likely-looking 

 clearings, margined with the usual tangle of undergrowth, veritable 

 gardens of wild flowers, with usually a pyramid of tall foxgloves as a 

 centrepiece. These clearings in ordinary seasons one would expect 

 to teem with insect life ; I found the majority blank, or at most 

 tenanted by a few crane-flies and immature grasshoppers. But just 

 below the forest on the steep hillsides, the northern slopes facing 

 Ancourt and Sauchay, various species were swarming, and this is, 

 undoubtedly, the most productive collecting-ground in the locality, 

 especially with regard to Lepidoptera. These slopes remind one of 

 many a Surrey hillside ; there are plenty of juniper bushes, and at 

 the time of my visit the purple orchis was in such profusion as to 

 make the hill look like heather clad. I spent three days rambling 

 about, and several times had to own that it is angle and not alti- 

 tude that necessitates exercise. The fourth day was pouring wet, 

 so I had to leave two portions of the district for some other time. 



