EARLY SPRING IN SAVERNAKE FOREST 213 



wild men of the woods ; and that solitude which 

 we create by shutting ourselves from the world 

 in a room or a house, is but a poor substitute — 

 nay, a sham : it is to immure ourselves in a cage, 

 a prison, which hardly serves to keep out the all- 

 pervading atmosphere of miserable conventions, 

 and cannot refresh and invigorate us. There are 

 seasons and moods when even the New Forest 

 does not seem sufficiently remote from life : in 

 its most secluded places one is always liable to 

 encounter a human being, an old resident, going 

 about in the exercise of his commoner's rights ; 

 or else his ponies or cows or swine. These last, 

 if they be not of some improved breed, may have a 

 novel or quaint aspect, as of wild creatures, but 

 the appearance is deceptive ; as you pass they lift 

 their long snouts from grubbing among the dead 

 leaves to salute you with a too famiUar grunt — 

 an assurance that William Rufus is dead, and all 

 is weU ; that they are domestic, and will spend 

 their last days in a stye, and end their life 

 respectably at the hands of the butcher. 



At"" Savemake there is nothing so humanised 

 as the pig, even of the old type ; you may roam 

 for long hours and see no man and no domestic 



