"'Of course I remember the old "Coach and Horses," at Hilsea. It was afterwards burnt down. There was formerly a guard-house and picket at Hilsea Bridge, where the soldiers' passes were examined. Hilsea Green we used to reckon the coldest spot between Portsmouth and London. Once some body-snatchers started from the "Green Posts," at Hilsea, with the officers in full cry after them, but the rascals had a famous mare, "Peg Hollis" (oh! she was a good 'un to go!), and got clear off. "'Yes, I knew Lord Adolphus Fitzclarence well; he was a good friend to me. Many's the time he has sat beside me on the box, and at the end of the stage slipped a crown-piece into my hand.'" XXII [Sidenote: _BY-WAYS_] At the "Seven Thorns" Inn the three counties of Sussex, Surrey, and Hants are supposed to meet; but, like so many of the picturesque legends of county and parish boundaries that make one house stand in three or four parishes, this particular legend is altogether unfounded, for the three counties meet in a dell about two miles southward of the road, in Hammer Bottom, where once stood a lonely beer-house called the "Sussex Bell." We will not turn aside to visit the site of the "Sussex Bell," or the remains of the Hammer Ponds that tell of the old iron-foundries and furnaces that were wont to make the surrounding hills resound and despoiled the dense woods of their noblest trees for the smelting of iron ore. We have no present business so far from the road in a place that has harboured no notorious evil-doer, nor has ever been the home of any distinguished man. But we may well turn aside after passing Cold Ash Hill to explore a singular relic of monkish days that still exists, built into a comparatively modern farm-house and forgotten by the world.