have accomplished with complete cynicism, and by specific acts whose
particular dates can be quoted, though historians are very naturally
careful to leave the process but vaguely analysed. Indeed, the last
and most valuable of these waste spaces, the New Forest itself, might
have entirely disappeared had not Charles I. (the last king in England
to attempt a repression of the landed class) so forcibly urged the
local engrosser to disgorge as to compel him, with Hampden and the
rest, to a burning zeal for political liberty.

This great waste space to the south of Windsor Hill became, after the
Conquest, the Forest, and apart from the hunting which it afforded to
the Royal palace, served a certain purpose on the military side as
well.

To develop a thought which has already been touched on in these pages,
mediaeval fortification was dual in character: it had either a purely
strategical object, in which case the site was chosen with an eye to
its military value, whether inhabited or not, or the stronghold or
fortification was made to develop an already existing town or site of
importance. Of the second sort was Wallingford, but of the first sort,
as we have seen, was Windsor. Indeed the distinction is normal to all
fortification and exists upon the Continent to-day. For instance, the
first-class fortress Paris is an example of the second sort, the
first-class fortress Toul of the first. Again, all German fortresses,
without exception, are of the second sort, while all Swiss
fortification, what little of it exists, is of the first.

Now where the first category is concerned a waste space is of value,
though its dimensions will vary in military importance according to
the means of communication of the time. A stronghold may be said to
repose upon that side through which communications are most difficult.

It is true that this space lying to the south of Windsor was of no
very great dimensions, but such as it was, uninhabited and therefore
unprovided with stores of any kind, it prevented surprise from the
south.

The next point of strategic importance on the Thames, and the last, is
the Tower.

Though it is below bridges it must fall into the scheme of this book,
because its whole military history and connection with the story of
England is bound up with the inland and not with the estuarial river.

It was, as has already been pointed out, one long day's march from
Windsor--a march along the old Roman road from Staines