92 FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 
a 
heather and the already yellowing fern; the tall and 
beautiful larches stand graceful in the stillness, Their 
‘lines always flow in pleasant curves; they need no wind 
to bend them into loveliness of form: so quiet and 
deserted is the place that the wide highway road is 
green with vegetation, and the impression of our wheels 
is the only trace upon them. Looking up, the road—up 
the hill—it appears green almost from side to side. It 
is well made and firm, and fit for any traffic; but a 
growth of minute weeds has sprung up, and upon these 
our wheels leave their marks. Of roads that have be- 
come grass-grown in war-desolated countries we have all 
read, but this is our own unscathed England. 
_ The nature of the ancient forest, its quiet and un- 
trodden silence, adheres to the site. Far down in the 
valley there is more stirring, and the way is well pulver- 
ised. In the hollow there is an open space, backed by 
the old beech trees of the park, dotted with ashes, and 
in the midst a farmhouse partly timbered. Here by the 
road-side they point out to you a low mound, at the very 
edge of the road, which could easily be passed unnoticed 
as a mere heap of scrapings overgrown with weeds and 
thistles. On looking closer it appears more regularly 
shaped ; it is indeed a grave. Of old time an unfortu- 
nate woman committed suicide, and according to the 
barbarous law of those days her body was buried at the 
cross-roads and a stake driven through it. That was the 
end so far as the brutal law of the land went. But the 
road-menders, with better hearts, from that day to this 
have always. kept up the mound. However beautiful 
the day, however beautiful the beech trees and the ashes 
that stand apart, there is always a melancholy feeling in 
passing the place. This thistle-grown mound saddens 
the whole ; it is impossible to forget it ; it lies, as it were, 
