of a thousand
foxgloves. The grassy path runs on, until on a sudden bend the ground
rises, and over a wooden stile opens out the vista of the great
Frensham Pond. Could there be a deeper contrast? Behind lies green
pasture-land, rush and sedge, oak and alder; before you, the shoulder of
a hill purple with ling, the long level of grey and silver water,
dancing under the wind away to a far strip of yellow sand flecked with
patches of white foam; high above that, burnt and blackened ridges of
heather-ground and gorse. Frensham Pond has often been painted, but that
is the view I should choose, as I saw it first. To one coming up from
these green depths of pasture, the air blows across the water with the
freshness of the sea.

[Illustration: _The Devil's Jumps, beyond Frensham Pond._]

Frensham Pond still lies open and wild to the sky, though it may not be
long before its shyer visitors leave it for more secluded waters. The
motor omnibuses from Farnham have not yet frightened them all away. Coot
and moorhens paddle in and out of the reeds, and great grebes float
leisurely about its surface. It has always been famous for its fishing.
In Aubrey's time it was "well known for its carps to the London
fishmongers," and to-day it holds pike, perch and tench. I heard of no
carp. Who would eat a carp?

In the bar of the little inn that stands on the edge of Frensham Pond
there is an interesting case holding two blackcocks and a grey-hen,
whose unhappy lot it was to be shot--perhaps the last of their race seen
in this part of Surrey. They were killed nineteen years ago, in 1889.
Actually the last blackcock chronicled in Surrey were a pair seen near
Hindhead, I believe in 1906.

[Illustration: _The Devil's Jumps, from Frensham Common._]

From Frensham Great Pond one may push on to Hindhead, three or four
miles to the south-east, or may return to Farnham through Tilford by way
of the Little Pond, another broad and shining stretch of water. The way
to Farnham is the better, for it means leaving the high road for the
natural paths that run over and round the windy ridges of the commonland
to the east. From the rising ground between the two Frensham ponds there
is a fine panorama of pine and heather. Crooksbury Hill juts up dark and
commanding to the north; the level line of the ridge on the left, a few
hundred yards away, is broken and humped with barrows; far away to the
east lies Charterhouse, grey in the haze by Godalming; behind