houses in 1955."

Quoth the irrepressible weaver: "Dear neighbour, since you knew the
Forest some time ago, could you tell me what truth there is in the
rumour that in the nineteenth century the trees were all pollards?"

This was catching me on my archaeological natural-history side, and I
fell into the trap without any thought of where and when I was; so I
began on it, while one of the girls, the handsome one, who had been
scattering little twigs of lavender and other sweet-smelling herbs
about the floor, came near to listen, and stood behind me with her
hand on my shoulder, in which she held some of the plant that I used
to call balm: its strong sweet smell brought back to my mind my very
early days in the kitchen-garden at Woodford, and the large blue
plums which grew on the wall beyond the sweet-herb patch,--a
connection of memories which all boys will see at once.

I started off: "When I was a boy, and for long after, except for a
piece about Queen Elizabeth's Lodge, and for the part about High
Beech, the Forest was almost wholly made up of pollard hornbeams
mixed with holly thickets. But when the Corporation of London took
it over about twenty-five years ago, the topping and lopping, which
was a part of the old commoners' rights, came to an end, and the
trees were let to grow. But I have not seen the place now for many
years, except once, when we Leaguers went a pleasuring to High Beech.
I was very much shocked then to see how it was built-over and
altered; and the other day we heard that the philistines were going
to landscape-garden it. But what you were saying about the building
being stopped and the trees growing is only too good news;--only you
know--"