REMARKS ON FOREST SCENERY, AND OTHER WOODLAND VIEWS. BY THE LATE WILLIAM GILPIN, A.M. EDITED BY SIR THOMAS DICK LAUDER, BART. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. II. EDINBURGH: FRASER & CO. NORTH BRIDGE; SMITH, ELDER & CO. CORNHILL, LONDON; W. CURRY, JUN. & CO. DUBLIN. MDCCCXXXIV. P BRITAIN, like other countries, abounded once in wood. When Cassibalan, Caractacus, and Boadicea, defended their country's rights, the country itself was a fortress. An extensive plain was then as uncommon as a forest is now. Fitz-Stephen, a monk of Canterbury, in the time of Henry II, tells us, that a large forest lay round London, " in which were woody groves, in the coverts whereof lurked bucks and does, wild boars, and bulls." To shelter beasts of the latter kind, we know a forest must be of some magnificence. These woods, contiguous even to the capital, continued close and thick, many ages afterwards. Even so late as Henry VII's time, we are informed by Polidore Virgil, that Tertia propemodum Angliæ pars pecori, aut cervis, damis, capreolis (nam et ii quoque in ea parte sunt, quæ ad septentrionem est) cuniculisve nutriendis relicta est inculta: quippe passim sunt ejusmodi ferarum vivaria, seu roboraria, quæ lignis roboreis sunt clausa unde multa venatio, qua se nobiles cum primis exercent." : * Almost the third part of England is uncultivated, and possessed only by stags, deer, or wild goats, which last are found chiefly in the northern parts. Rabbits, too, abound everywhere. You everywhere meet with vast forests, where these wild beasts range at large, or with parks secured by pales. Hunting is the principal amusement of all the people of distinction. |