is a confession of
failure; while to urge that one has but to ask for the key to be able
to enter a church is no true reply, since hospitality, whether to the
body or the soul, loses in sweetness and effect as it loses in
spontaneity.

[Sidenote: TO CROWBOROUGH]

From Heron's Ghyll to Crowborough is a steady climb for three miles,
with the heathery wastes of Ashdown Forest on the left and the hilly
district around Mayfield on the right.

CHAPTER XXXII

CROWBOROUGH AND MAYFIELD

Crowborough the suburban--Rotherfield's three rivers--The extra
ribs--Wild flowers and railway companies--The perfect hill--An arid
district--St. Dunstan and the Devil--Why Tunbridge Wells waters are
chalybeate--St. Dunstan's feats--An unencouraging _memento
mori_--Mayfield church--Mayfield street--The diary of Mr. Walter
Gale, schoolmaster.

In the spring of this year (1903) the walls and fences of Crowborough
were covered with the placards of a firm of estate agents describing the
neighbourhood (in the manner of the great George Robins) as "Scotland in
Sussex." The simile may be true of the Ashdown Forest side of the Beacon
(although involving an unnecessary confusion of terms), but "Hampstead
in Sussex" would be a more accurate description of Crowborough proper.
Never was a fine remote hill so be-villa'd. The east slope is all
scaffold-poles and heaps of bricks, new churches and chapels are
sprouting, and the many hoardings announce that Follies, Pierrots, or
conjurors are continually imminent. Crowborough itself has shops that
would not disgrace Croydon, and a hotel where a Lord Mayor might feel at
home. Houses in their own grounds are commoner than cottages, and near
the summit the pegs of surveyors and the name-boards of avenues yet to
be built testify to the charms which our Saxon Caledonia has already
exerted.

But to say this is not to say all. Crowborough may be populous and
over-built; but it is still a glorious eminence, the healthiest and most
bracing inland village in the county, and the key to its best moorland
country. Since Crowborough's normal visitor either plays golf or is
contented with a very modest radius, the more adventurous walker may
quickly be in the solitudes.

In the little stone house below the forge Richard Jefferies lived for
some months at the end of his life.

[Sidenote: ROTHERFIELD]

Crowborough is crowned by a red hotel which can never pass into the
landscap