The Pool, or ' Dipping-Place ' 



— washing out the flints that now lie at the bottom. 

 Hawthorn bushes bend over it, and great briars uncut since 

 their first shoot was put forth ; the elder, too, grows 

 luxuriously, whose white flowers, emitting a rich but sickly 

 odour, the village girls still gather to make elder-water to 

 remove freckles. These bushes hide the deep gully in 

 which the current winds its way — so deep that no cattle 

 can get down to drink. 



A cottage stands on the very edge a little further 

 along; the residents do not dip their water from the 

 running stream, but have made a small pool beside it, 

 with which no doubt it communicates, for the pool, or 

 'dipping-place,' is ever full of cool, clear, limpid water. 

 The plan is not without its advantages, because the stream 

 itself, though usually clear, is liable to become foul from 

 various causes — such as a flood, when it is white from 

 suspended chalk, or from cattle higher up above the 

 gully coming to slake their thirst and stirring the sandy 

 grit of the bottom. But the little pool long remains 

 clear, because the water from the stream to enter it has 

 to strain itself through the narrow partition of chalky 

 rubble. 



So limpid is the current in general, that the idea of 

 seeing trout presently when it shall widen out naturally 

 arises. But before then the soil changes, and clay and 

 loam spoil the clean, sandy, or gravelly bottom trout de- 

 light in. In one such stream hard by, however, the 

 experiment of keeping trout has been tried, and with some 

 success : it could be done without a doubt if it were not 

 that after a short course all the streams upon this side 

 of the downs enter the meadows, and immediatly run over 

 a mud bottom. With care, a few young fish were main- 

 tained in the upper waters, but it was only as an experi- 



