6 NATURE IN DOWNLAND 



light simply to walk on that elastic turf and to breathe 

 that pure air. 



But for all my pleasure and interest in the district, 

 I had no faintest thought of a book about it. Why 

 indeed should any one dream of a book about this 

 range of hills, so near to the metropolis, its sea coast 

 and coast towns the favourite haunt of hundreds of 

 thousands of annual visitors ; every hill in the range, 

 and every species of wild bird and mammal and 

 insect and flower, known to every one ? Without 

 inquiry I took it that there were books and books 

 about the South Downs, as there are about every 

 place on earth and every earthly thing; and that I 

 did not know them because I had not looked for 

 them, and they had never by chance come in my 

 way. It thus happened that in all my rambles in 

 downland, with no motive but pleasure and health, 

 I did only that which it is customary for me to do 

 in all places where I may happen to be — namely, to 

 note down every interesting fact I came across in my 

 field naturalist's journal. Now all at once " something 

 has come into my mind" — to wit, a little book ex- 

 clusively about these hills in which I shall be able 

 to incorporate a good number of observations which 

 would otherwise be wasted. But I do not say like 

 downright old Ben Jonson that it "must and shall" 

 be written, whether far removed from the wolf's black 

 jaw and the other objectionable animal's hoof or not. 

 For it will be, I imagine, a small unimportant book, 



