26 
[LETT 
The former, being all in the parish of Binsted, is about two 
miles in extent from north to south, and nearly as much from east 
to west ; and contains within it many woodlands and lawns, and 
the great lodge where the grantees reside ; and a smaller lodge 
called Goose-green ; and is abutted on by the parishes of Kings- 
ley, Frinsham, Farnham, and Bentley ; all of which have right 
of common. 
One thing is remarkable, that tliough the Holt has been of 
old Avell stocked with fallow-deer, unrestrained by any pales or 
fences more than a common liedge, yet they were never seen 
within the limits of Wolmer ; nor were the red deer of Wolmer 
ever known to haunt the thickets or glades of the Holt. 
At present the deer of the Holt are much thinned and reduced 
by the night-hunters, who perpetually harass them in spite of 
the efforts of numerous keepers, and the severe penalties that 
have been put in force against them as often as they have been 
detected and rendered liable to the lasli of the law. Neither 
lines nor imprisonments can deter them : so impossible is it to 
extinguish the spirit of sporting, which seems to be inherent in 
human nature. 
General Howe turned out some German wild boars and sows 
in his forests, to the great terror of the neighbourhood ; and, at 
one time, a wild bull or buffalo : but the country rose upon 
them and destroyed them.^ 
A very large fall of timber, consisting of about one thousand 
oaks, has been cut this spring (viz. 1784) in the Holt forest ; 
one-fifth of which, it is said, belongs to the grantee, Lord Stawel. 
He lays claim also to the lop and top : but the poor of the 
parishes of Binsted and Frinsham, Bentley and Kingsley, assert 
that it belongs to them : and, assembling in a riotous manner, 
have actually taken it all away. One man, who keeps a team, 
has carried home, for his share, forty stacks of wood. Forty- 
five of these people his lordship has served with actions. These 
trees, which were very sound and in high perfection, were 
winter-cut, viz., in February and March, before the bark would 
^ German boars and sows were also turned out in the New Forest by 
Charles the First, which bred and increased ; and tlieir stock is supposed to 
exist still. — MiTFORD, 
