While descending on the turf among the harebells (hairbells?) I found a specimen of the blue gentian. What a study is every flower--how beautifully is it finished inside and outside! I thought of the “lilies of the field.” Solomon and his array! How would he have looked with his robes reversed? I made my way to the river, and walked along it in a path fringed with golden ragwort, then passed through the millyard, crossed the river, and continued along its margin till I reached the cottage gardens, and emerged close to the bridge at the end of High Street. FOOTNOTES: [98] Best known to many for the scene in “Henry Dunbar.” [99] The “Hundred Mennes Hall” is now used as a barn. [100] She is said to have been “a respectable lady.” The jury hesitated, but Jeffreys insisted. James was swift upon rebels. He wanted his brother Charles to hang Milton. [101] On the walls are the names of several masters. R. Buteshall was master in 1346. Roger Sherborne and Henry Compton both became bishops. EIGHTH AND FOLLOWING DAYS. Ancient Britons--St. John’s Church--Magdalen Hospital--Punchbowl--Chilcombe--St. Peter’s Cheesehill--Twyford--Monoliths--Brambridge Avenue--Otterbourne--Compton--“Oliver’s Battery”--Hursley--Tomb of Keble--Merdon Castle--Farley Mount--The Hampage Oak--Tichborne. Chilcombe!--in the Domesday Book Ciltecumbe--what a deliciously Celtic name! It reminds us of the time when “Gwent” also was only a group of beehive huts. We can see such in Cornwall at the present day. “Gwent” (whence Venta Belgarum[102] and Winchester) signified an opening. A river beneath a grassy hill was a cheering sight to the early inhabitant of Britain. The chalk downs here afforded a clear expanse by which he could reach the interior of the country without any fear of losing his way among trees or being attacked by wild beasts. The forests then abounded with large stags, wolves, bears, and wild oxen. [Sidenote: The Itchen.]