26 
NATURAL HISTORY 
tlieir smoke^ and often alarm tlie country ; and once in par- 
ticularj I remember that a gentleman, who lives beyond 
Andover, coming to my house, when he got on the downs 
between that town and Winchester, at twenty-five miles 
distance, was surprised much with smoke and a hot smell of 
fire, and concluded that Alresford was in flames ; but when 
he came to that town, he then had apprehensions for the 
next village, and so on to the end of his journey. 
On two of the most conspicuous eminences of this forest 
stand two arbours or bowers, made of the boughs of oaks ; 
the one called Waldon-lodge, the other Brimstone-lodge : 
these the keepers renew annually on the feast of St. Bar- 
nabas, taking the old materials for a perquisite. The farm 
called Blackmoor, in this parish, is obliged to find the posts 
and brushwood for the former; while the farms at Greatham, 
in rotation, furnish for the latter, and are all enjoined to 
cut and deliver the materials at the spot. This custom I 
mention, because I look upon it to be of very remote 
antiquity. 
LETTER YIII. 
TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE. 
N 'the verge of the forest, as it is now circum- 
scribed, are three considerable lakes, Iwo in 
Oakhanger, of which I have nothing parti- 
cular to say; and one called Bin^s or Bean's 
Pond, which is worthy the attention of a 
naturalist or a sportsman. For, being crowded at the upper 
end with willows, and with the Garcx cespitosa,^ it affords 
such a safe and pleasing shelter to wild ducks, teals, snipes, 
&c. that they breed there. In the winter this covert is also 
^ I mean that sort which, rising into tall hassocks, is called by the 
foresters torrets — a corruption, I suppose, of turrets. — G. W. 
