226 OUR WOODLAND TREES. 
ghostly visitors to this forest glade make their 
way into the midst of the assembled crowd. 
Another shout rises into the air, and then for a 
moment all is still as death. The silence, how- 
ever, is of short duration. The sound of a church 
clock, striking the midnight hour, is followed by 
a third shout, longer and louder than the two pre- 
ceding ones. Then there are gleams from twenty 
axes; the sound of falling wood; a crackling of 
small twigs; a hasty gathering up of limbs and 
branches; another momentary pause; and then a 
last, long, lingering shout, as fierce and lurid 
flames dart upwards from the knoll top, and light 
up—not ghostly but human forms and faces. 
The preceding sketch, gentle reader, is not a 
description of an imaginary event, but a record of 
facts; and to a chance wayfarer or a belated 
traveller who was a stranger in the particular dis- 
trict on the night in question, the proceedings 
recorded would have seemed as mysterious as 
they have been here represented to be. They 
were, in truth, but the exercise of a very curious 
annual custom, peculiar to Epping Forest, and 
unique in the annals of forestry. This custom, 
