EPPING FOREST. 119 
the rights of the Commoners of the district, of turning 
out cattle in it. 
In 1851 an Act was passed (14 and 15 Victoria c. 
43) for the disafforesting of Hainault Forest and for its 
inclosure. The waste consisted of 4,000 acres, of which 
2,842 were in the Manors belonging to the Crown; and 
‘in this part was the beautiful King’s Wood—a far finer 
woodland district than anything in Epping Forest. Of 
this, 1,917 acres were allotted to the Crown, and the re- 
mainder was given in compensation to the Commoners. 
The Lord Warden received £5,250 in compensation for 
the abolition of his hereditary office. The trees were 
grubbed on the Crown allotments, at a cost of £42,000, 
which was paid for by the sale of timber. The cleared 
land was laid out in farms. As a result, in 1863, the 
rent of the land was £4,000 a year as compared with an 
annual income from the Forest of £500. But it resulted 
that there was lost for ever one of the most beautiful of 
natural Forests in the south of England, within easy 
reach of London. Not a protest seems to have been 
raised against this course, either in Parliament, or on 
the part of the Press or the public. 
In view of this proceeding of the Crown, it was 
perhaps to be expected that the owners of the Manors in 
Epping Forest should consider that they were only pur- 
suing the same public policy, in endeavouring to follow 
its example, by inclosing the waste lands of the Forest 
within their several Manors, but with little regard for the 
rights of Commoners, and still less for the rights or inter- 
ests of the inhabitants of their districts, or of the people 
