cut in two, by a floor and bedrooms built in the upper
part. This is what has happened at Tangley and at Crowhurst Place, and
in each case the remains of the hall can be traced in the superb oak
tie-beams which cross the bedrooms from side to side of the house. The
hall is cased by a more modern building, a rich timber framework with
the date 1582 carved sprawling on the wood. The garden has every charm
that can belong to lichened brick walls, loop-holed and many-gated, and
through the garden round the house runs a moat, in which trout swim, or
once swam. John Evelyn of Wotton knew the Tangley manor moat and garden;
possibly some of the daffodils which brighten the grass in April are
descendants of bulbs he planted. On a pane of glass in one of the
bedrooms he has scratched his name and the date "John Euelyn, 1641."

Beyond Tangley Manor to the north the railway runs a loose parallel to
the little Tillingbourne, through Chilworth, Albury, Shere and Gomshall.
But the villages of the Tillingbourne belong to another chapter.

CHAPTER IX

THE VILLAGES OF THE TILLINGBOURNE

Chilworth.--Gunpowder and Banknotes.--Cashier for fifty years.--The
Evelyns' Powdermills.--Albury's chimneys.--A Yew hedge quarter of a
mile long.--Sherborne ponds: the Silent Pool.--King John and Sabrina
drowned.--Trout fed on Sandwiches.--Shere.--The prettiest village of
all.--The Tillingbourne.--William Bray, aged 97.--A Yeoman's
Will.--Shere Registers.--From Ann to Carbetia.--Gomshall.--Starving
a Retainer.

Four villages and a group of powdermills stand on the banks of the
Tillingbourne, which runs its short race of clear spring water from the
northern slopes of Leith Hill to the Wey by Shalford. There are scarcely
a dozen miles of the Tillingbourne altogether, but it runs through the
prettiest string of villages in the county. Friday Street is at its
source; Abinger Hammer, with two large millponds, is next; Gomshall lies
a mile to the west of Abinger Hammer, Shere a mile to the west again,
and Albury beyond Shere. Chilworth stands last on the bright little
stream, hardly a village; not much more than a station, some
powdermills, and reedy ponds.

The quickest road from Guildford to Chilworth is the railway. The best
road is over the downs. The road which Cobbett took when he came from
Kensington was over Merrow Downs to Newlands Corner, and it is worth
while to climb up Newlands Corner to look at the view a