There is a strip of country lying south of Purley in which you cannot get more than a mile and a half or so from the railway, but which contains tiny hamlets and lonely roads. Purley and Kenley will one day come out to Coulsdon, perhaps, but Coulsdon's day is not yet. The village itself is nothing more than a cottage or two with a church. But the road to Coulsdon opens on broad slopes of grass and plough, bordered with a line of yews--an ancient trackway, perhaps. Such a line, or rather lines, for there are several along the sides of the downs a little further south, would certainly be claimed as evidence of a "pilgrims' way" if they ran east and west between Guildford, say, and Dorking. Fields with such noble hedges to define them have their own air of wildness and age; it is easy enough, even with Purley slate roofs hardly a mile away, to fancy partridges calling across those open spaces. Coulsdon, indeed, was once celebrated for its game. Aubrey tells us that in the parish there was "a large coney-warren belonging to the Desbouveries." They, for many years under Stuarts and Georges, were lords of the manor. From Coulsdon one may walk to Chaldon over Farthing Down. The horizon changes, but Farthing Down itself remains high and free, smooth with short down grass, and dinted with the hoofs of galloping horses. Croydon and Purley send many riders abroad on Saturdays and Sundays. But Farthing Down is peopled with other older forms. Along the ridge, bordering the ancient trackways, lies a line of barrows. They were opened in 1872 by Mr. John Wickham Flower; some were found untouched, and contained perfect skeletons. In one grave lay the bones of a great lady; buried with her was a beautiful wooden drinking-cup, its staves fastened by bronze bands of an intricate Runic pattern of coiled snakes. Another grave held the skeleton of a warrior giant, his sword lying across him and the boss of his shield upon his foot. Mr. Flower thinks he can add a name. Coulsdon is a corruption of Cuthredesdune, and perhaps Cuthred, an Anglo-Saxon prince, lies buried here with his family. Cuthred, son of Cwichelm, and grandson of Cynegils, the first Christian king of Wessex, was baptised in 639 at Dorchester.