At the end of the lakelet I discovered a picturesque water-mill--grey and old, with a weatherboard upper story, and a red-tiled, lichen-laden, uneven roof, silvery and golden--its dark green wheel revolving round in a leisurely fashion to the droning of the ancient machinery within, and the quiet splash of water without. A ready-made picture awaiting the artist to paint it, if he has not already done so. Somehow the sounds of water and wind-driven machinery seem to me to be different in quality to that of steam-driven machinery with its insistent noise: water and wind are natural powers, and both water-mills and windmills with their adjuncts are picturesque objects to the eye, but I know no steam-mill that is not ugly. In the days before steam became the almost universal power, and the modern builder and engineer had not disfigured the country with their assertive erections, how doubly beautiful England must have been! Would that photography had been invented ages ago, then we might possibly have had photographs of Elizabethan England preserved to us, so that we might better judge of its picturesqueness than by descriptions and drawings not always to be trusted. I know of no other pleasanter stretch of highway in all England than those few miles on either hand of "The Sheffield Arms"; on both sides of it are spacious grassy margins left to nature, and they extend as far as the eye can see, and the sum of them would come to a considerable acreage. On these wide wastes grow big oaks and other trees; especially noticeable are numerous clumps of Scotch firs that, with their tall red trunks and twisted branches high above, give quite a character to the roadscape, if I may employ so odd a term; besides which brambles, heather, bracken, gorse, and other wild growing things flourish on them at their own sweet will. An ideal spot for a wayside picnic, where one might choose a secluded nook near to the road, yet hidden from it. Here at least no "hungry nobility have swallowed up all the land except the King's Highway." There was not a soul in sight; the vacant road impressed me with the same sense of loneliness as does a house deserted, for I looked for life and found none. On a slight rise, a little away from the road and not far from the inn, I espied a tall, shapely, solitary stone pillar, weather-stained and worn, backed by a tangle of greenery. This aroused my curiosity, so off I set to solve its purport--and discovered a glorified milestone, manifestly erected in days somewhat remote; the lettering on it was, in parts, wasted away and so difficult to decipher, but I managed to make out certain of the names and figures, and this is what I noted: Miles. Westminster Bridge 39 East Grinstead 10 Lewes 10 Brighthelmstone 17