Surrey: Painted by Sutton Palmer; Described by A.R. Hope MoncrieffMoncrieff, A. R. Hope (Ascott Robert Hope)
History
Surrey: Painted by Sutton Palmer; Described by A.R. Hope Moncrieff
Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (Ascott Robert Hope)
Surrey (England) -- Description and travel
The right fork of the high-road soon leads us past the Staff College and
Sandhurst into Hampshire, reached by the left fork at Frimley. To keep
inside of Surrey, and to have one of the finest walks in the county, I
should choose the byroad which at the "Jolly Farmer" turns south along
the Chobham ridges. Here, some miles west of Chobham village, rises a
sandy bank about 400 feet high, beautifully covered with heath, ferny
copses and pine-wood, where one might believe oneself in the Highlands
but for the open prospects on either hand. The sides of late years have
been cut up by the building of various institutions; and towards the
farther end of the four-mile road it is frowned on by War Office notices
that trespassers are within range of stray bullets from the Pirbright
and Bisley ranges lying below the east side. While firing goes on,
there will be a red flag on the bold edge of Windmill Hill, which at the
south end of the ridge drops brokenly to the railway and the Basingstoke
Canal. This long unfortunate waterway, one understands, is now restored,
and to be worked by a new proprietor. But whether full or empty, it
gives a very pleasant walk by its bushy banks, often shaded by firs or
birchwood, its winding reaches, its sedgy bays and lagoons, and its
heathy environment. These features are especially un-canal-like on the
first crooked bend beyond Windmill Hill towards Aldershot.
In the other direction, a couple of miles of it leads to Brookwood
station, past the Pirbright Camp of the Guards on the opposite side.
Behind this lie the ranges of Bisley, where the volunteer camp,
transplanted from Wimbledon, blossoms out so gaily and jollily for a
July fortnight, during which our amateur soldiers bear warlike
hardships, made not too uncomfortable, the worst of it being usually a
thunderstorm or two that put whiskered Pandours of Fleet Street to their
shifts. The nucleus of permanent buildings appears on a low height
north-west of Brookwood station, then, beyond, the ranges run up against
the Chobham ridge, where barren banks display the "Hundred Butts" and
other groups of targets like that nicknamed "Siberia," or the sliding
course of the "Running Deer," so familiar to ambitious marksmen. On the
north side the knolls of the camp look to the no longer secluded village
of Bisley, with its outskirts Donkey Green and West End, growing along
the roads towards Bagshot and Windlesham.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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