ALICEHOLT AND WOOLMER FOREST. 115 



the arbitrary price of 38s it only produced =£1,074 10s 9d, 

 to which was to be added about £80 for stackwood, taken 

 away by the people of Frensham under a pretended right, 

 and out of which was to be deducted £179 19s 9i^dfor 

 the expenses of cutting, &c., charged in the surveyor's 

 account. In this case again it was a lady. Lady Hills- 

 borough/ who was lieutenant of the forest, and bewailed 

 the loss of perquisites she was undergoing by the timber 

 being used in the national service. It is, however, cheer- 

 ing to know that she gained nothing by her complaint. 

 The Frensham folk, however, appear to have been the De 

 Morgans of the day, for in 1788 another fall of 500 loads 

 was ordered, and it being also ordered that the entire fall, 

 including offal wood, should be sold by public auction, 

 they openly carried the latter off, to the number of 6,365 

 fagots, in one day and night. The Royal Commission 

 observe, ' In case the lieutenant should establish a right 

 to the boughs and branches of all trees felled in the forest, 

 we apprehend it to be extremely necessary that it should 

 be determined what parts of a timber tree are compre- 

 hended under that description. It is well known that in 

 navy timber, some of the most valuable pieces, as knees, 

 crooks, &c., are taken from the limbs or branches of trees, 

 and that other parts of the branches frequently contain 

 timber fit for carpentry uses. It sometimes happens, also, 

 that trees apparently fit for the navy prove unfit for that 

 use, from some defect not discoverable while they are 

 standing ; which trees, nevertheless, contain good building 

 timber, and large butts of trees and other pieces of timber are 

 frequently cut off as unfit for the navy, but which are very 

 useful for other purposes. So that if the lieutenant were 

 allowed to take all that is not fit for the use of the navy, as 

 was done in the fall of 1,000 loads in 1 784, he would, upon 

 every fall made for the navy, have considerable quantities 

 of useful timber which could not be comprised under the 

 description of boughs and branches. It is equally neces- 

 sary,' continue the Commissioners, ' that this point should 

 be settled before any farther wood sales are made in this 



