And yet the amount of “waste” land in and around Willenhall was once excessive, as the writings of George Borrow cannot fail to convey (Chap. XXVIII.). In Chap. XXII. we read of Canne Byrch, situated in “Willenhall Field,” lying in the highway towards Darlaston, where perhaps the village community of ancient times tilled their lands in common; and more directly of the “waste or common land” called Shepwell Green; a wide stretch of open land once apparently stretching away towards the wilderness and solitudes of that gipsy-land immortalised by George Borrow. “Willenhall Green” is named by Dr. Plot, writing in 1686, as a place where yellow ochre was found a yard below the surface, and which after being beaten up was made into oval cakes to be sold at fourpence a dozen to glovers, who used it in combination with cakes of “blew clay,” found at Darlaston and Wednesbury, “for giving their wares an ash colour.” The old highway between Walsall and Wolverhampton lay along Walsall Street, through Cross Street, and the Market Place; the new coach route, or the New Road, as it was called, was made in the early part of the nineteenth century. New Invention is a place-name which originated not from any connection with the local industries, as one might be led to expect, but from nothing more serious than a nickname of derision. The tradition is that many years ago an inhabitant from the centre of the town was strolling out that way, when he was thus accosted by an acquaintance living in one of the few cottages which then comprised the neighbourhood, and who was standing on his own doorstep to enjoy the cool of the evening: “I say, Bill, hast seen my new invention?” “No, lad; what is it?” “That’s it!” said the self-satisfied householder, pointing up to a hawthorn bush which was pushed out of the top of his chimney. “That’s it! It’s stopped our o’d chimdy smokin’, I can tell thee!” And ever after that the locality which this worthy honoured with his ingenious presence was slyly dubbed by his amused neighbours the “New Invention,” by which name it afterwards became generally known.