Leith Hill

“ But the stretch of downland running from Guildford to Newlands Corner has a charm that belongs to none of these. It is not merely the peace and sunshine of the broad path along the ridge, with its downland flowers and Chalk Hill Blue butterflies; not only the width and extent of the view over the Weald, though it is of all views in Surrey one of the loveliest—unlike the flatter panoramas of Leith Hill and Reigate in that it is a view not only of fields and meadows, but of tree-clad hills, shouldering into fainter greens and greys away to Hampshire and Sussex. The enchantment is something else ”

“ Heather glows in the openings of the pines, bracken brushes rain on your sleeve, bilberries ripen in the scented heat, and almost any path—though not the road—runs higher and higher to the open ground at the very top. At the top, nine hundred and sixty-five feet up, you are on the highest hill in the south-east of England.
Leith Hill is not for the multitude which climbs Box Hill. It is further from London, and further from a railway station. But it calls its own companies of travellers, and they are often large ”

“ But did Aubrey ever see the full vision? If he did, he climbed the hill on a lucky day. English weather sends few days clear enough of mist to set a sharp outline on the Kentish downs, the Buckinghamshire hills and the slopes of Wiltshire, and the combination of transparent air and presence in the neighbourhood of a great height must be rare for ordinary men. Yet Leith Hill, even on the mistiest day, can give the true notion of height. The first day I climbed it was after a night of July rain. A wind had sprung up and seemed from the lower roads about the hill to have blown the distance clear. ”

“ Fields and great trees, and here and there the white smoke of a passing train and beyond the Blackdown and the misty slopes of Leith Hill—Hillyard was never to forget it, neither that scene nor the eager face and shining eyes of Joan Whitworth against the blue and gold of the summer afternoon.
"You will remember that you have friends here, who will be glad to hear news of you," she said, and she threw in the clutch and started the car down the hill. ”

“ The hill which I speak of is called Leith-hill, and is about five miles southward from Dorking, about six miles from Box-hill, and near twelve from Epsom. It juts itself out about two miles beyond that range of hills, which terminate the north downs to the south. After conquering the hill itself the sight is enchantingly beautiful. Beneath lie open to our view all the wilds of Surrey and Sussex, and a great part of that of Kent, admirably diversified in every part of them with woods, and fields of corn and pasture, and everywhere adorned with stately rows of trees. ”

“ LEITH HILL THE reader is now to be conducted on and about what, to my mind, makes the bouquet of the county’s scenery. Leith Hill is the highest point not only of Surrey, but in this corner of England, the topmost knoll on its southern brow being 965 feet above the sea, crowned by a tower that adds nearly 100 feet to the natural elevation. The tower was built in the eighteenth century by a local squire named Hull, apparently a “character,” who had himself buried in it, to the scandal of his neighbours. It has since been restored and opened by the present proprietors, the Evelyns of Wotton. ”

“ The way to the summit of Leith Hill is through pine-woods and along a road of such excellent surface and so gradual a rise that this hilltop expedition is not [106] at all fatiguing. It leads by degrees half round the hill, and brings one to a point where the road is crossed by a white gate, directly under the tower that crowns the hilltop. To leave one’s cycle here against a tree-trunk, and to clamber up the chalky final ascent to where the tower stands on its flat plateau, is the best plan. ”

“ The porch has been renewed, and the room has gone.
Wotton House stands in a dip of grassland under noble trees. It is little like what it was in Evelyn's day, for fire has taken away part of it, and much that is new is added. The result is partly imposing, partly incongruous; but much of the best of the house has aged well, and the red-brick court and walled carriage-drive stand finely from their background. Behind the house is the terraced garden which Evelyn himself made, and beyond it a streak of water running between wooded banks away to the blue dimness of Leith Hill. ”

“ Leith Hill, nine hundred and sixty-seven feet in height, is the greatest elevation at all near our path; but we shall pass some three miles or so to the westward of it, if the air remains calm; and Saint Catherine’s Point, over which we shall pass, is only seven hundred and seventy-five feet high. So that we have nothing to fear. ”

“ But if a refreshed climber had still half a day before him, good shoe leather under him, and a stout heart for stiff ups and downs, I would invite him to follow other crests of the sand ridge westwards; or at least to visit Leith Hill’s neighbour, Holmbury Hill, about two miles in that direction.
Let us descend, then, into the valley between, bearing a little northward to strike the choice village that now knows itself as Holmbury St. Mary, but for country-folk around is more familiar under the old name of Felday, and part of it on the O.S. map is belittled as Pitland Street. ”

“ George's Hill is blocked with trees, so is St. Anne's; Leith Hill is almost clear, but from Hindhead, until those unlucky pines grew up, you could see pretty nearly thirty miles on any side. Not that the Devil's Dyke and the downs beyond cannot any longer be seen from Hindhead; you can get a fine view of them a mile away to the north, from the old Portsmouth road, on the other side of the new road, but from that point the view is not nearly so fine on the other sides. The hill is not so high. On Gibbet Hill you are 895 feet above sea level according to the ordnance map ”

“ Here opens a new fan of woodland walks. The road southwards leads to Gomshall station in about three miles. The best way from Felday to the top of Leith Hill is through a park gate beyond the “Hollybush,” then diverging on the right of the drive as an embowered lane where boards marked “private” keep one from straying till a road is reached, across which an open slope leads to the tower. ”

“ When the lane expands take path on left through the wood to a field with path going right up its steep incline. At top of field, before again entering the woods, a superb view eastward is obtained. Through a gap in the hills, between Box Hill and Deepdene, we look far{132} away over the Weald of Kent. The crowning height of Leith Hill with its tower lies south-east, then the eye ranges over the valley between the Chalk and Greensand ranges to Holmbury and Ewhurst Mill. ”

“ All the way along, the chalk-ridge is [Pg 222] the most lofty, until you come to Leith Hill and Hindhead; and here, at Folkestone, the sand-ridge tapers off in a sort of flat towards the sea. The land is like what it is at Reigate, a very steep hill; a hill of full a mile high, and bending exactly in the same manner as the hill at Reigate does. The turnpike-road winds up it and goes over it in exactly the same manner as that at Reigate. The land to the south of the hill begins a poor, thin, white loam upon the chalk; soon gets to be a very fine rich loam upon the chalk ”

“ Capel people have long had proper views as to the right rate of progress through the business of life. They are skilled, or some of them, in topiary, and when the garden of a tiny, red-tiled cottage contains a shaven yew tree recognisable as a fair-sized bird, the tenour of village life must be agreeably even.
Third of the three villages which group themselves south and south-west of Leith Hill is Newdigate, separated from Capel by over two miles of a zig-zagging road, though the distance for a steeplechase cannot be much more than a mile from church to church. ”

“ But if strangers cannot gain the lofty beech terrace, commanding such a rich woodland prospect, and from a lane outside must be content with a tantalising peep of the rhododendron show within, they may take a public path to the Glory Wood behind the town; or, on its east side, in the valley of the Mole, they find the avenues of Betchworth Park open as a way to Brockham; while the grounds of Box Hill, and some of the finest outskirts of Leith Hill, such as the Nower park-slopes, offer free rambles. ”

“ The people went and came, in excited groups, upon the fragrant grass of the Calton Hill; sometimes turning to the other side of the landscape, to see the more sparely lighted streets of gentility, or the independent little sparkle which stout little Leith in the distance threw out upon the Firth—but always returning with unfailing fascination to this scene of magic—the old town shining with its lamps and jewels, like a city in a dream. ”

“ Few persons have any idea what an immense variety of plant life is to be found within the limits of the Town Belt alone. Starting at its Southern end on the knolls and slopes about Montecillo, and following round in front of Mornington, Roslyn, and Maori Hill, then crossing down into the Leith Valley, up the hill above the Botanical Gardens, and round the further side of Pelichet Bay, the lover of flowers and ferns will meet with hundreds of species, many of them of striking beauty. ”

“ Sometimes the Upper Limestone gradually merges into a black indurated sand composed of particles of glauconite, felspar, topaz, &c, which forms a variegated bed made up of black, green, brown, and red sands intermixed and stratified. This variety is well seen on the scarp of the hill of Chelmus in Gozo, where it is fully 30 feet in thickness. Altogether the greatest depth attained by the Sand bed may be little less than 60 feet. ”

“ Leith Links, one of the homes of golf in Scotland, is a popular resort, on Lochend Road are situated Hawkhill recreation grounds, and Lochend Loch is used for skating and curling. There are small links at Newhaven, and in Trinity are Starbank Park and Cargilfield playing ground. The east pier (1177 yds. long) and the west pier (1041 yds.) are favourite promenades. The waterway between them is the entrance to the harbour. Leith cemetery is situated at Seafield and the Eastern cemetery in Easter Road.
The oldest industry is shipbuilding, which dates from 1313. ”

“ There is no ancient church, for it was washed away in a flood in the early part of the eighteenth century. The beautiful views seen at Whitney unfold themselves more and more as one reaches Letton, Merbach Hill upon the right, rising high out of the ground like a hog's back, giving a characteristic touch to the scenery. At Letton a particularly beautiful group of black-and-white timbered cottages stand by the side of the road, and remind one that English soil has been reached, and that the never-ending monotony of the Welsh whitewashed cottages has at last been left behind. ”

“ To the west, the wide arms of the Granton breakwaters enclose a harbour, built at the cost of the Duke of Buccleuch. Nearer to Leith is the white pier-head of Newhaven, with stalwart fishermen, and comely fishwives in white “mutches” and short petticoats, grouped about its quays. Leith itself is an old as well as a brisk seat of trade and shipping. The large business it continues to conduct with the ports of the Baltic and the North Sea it has carried on for many centuries, and in these days it has extended its commercial [Pg 68] relations to nearly all parts of the world. ”

“ Had the overlords been more considerate incorporation with Edinburgh would not have been so bitterly resisted. Several of the quaint bits of ancient Leith yet remain, and the appearance of the shore as it was in the 17th and 18th centuries, and even at a later date, was picturesque in the extreme. During the centuries of strife between Scotland and England its situation exposed the port to attack both by sea and land. ”

“ Lights burn high up in the tall lands and on the Castle turrets; they burn low down in Greenside or along the Park. They run out one beyond the other into the dark country. They walk in a procession down to Leith, and shine singly far along Leith Pier. Thus, the plan of the city and her suburbs is mapped out upon the ground of blackness, as when a child pricks a drawing full of pinholes and exposes it before a candle; not the darkest night of winter can conceal her high station and fanciful design; every evening in the year she proceeds to illuminate herself in honour of her own beauty ”

“ Our intuition told us that we were near the retreat, and we halted the hurrying guide, and in the shelter of a boulder explained to him with more signs and gestures that we wished to proceed with extreme caution. The end of the gulch that was not more than a stone's throw from the face of the cliff was already dark with the shadows of the hills, and as we suspected that the opening to Leith's refuge was close, we wished to make no unnecessary noise in approaching it. ”

“ My way was down the glen of the Leith River, towards Stockbridge and Silvermills. A path led in the foot of it, the water bickered and sang in the midst; the sunbeams overhead struck out of the west among long shadows and (as the valley turned) made like a new scene and a new world of it at every corner. With Catriona behind and Alan before me, I was like one lifted up. ”

“ Leith was more affable than usual on that afternoon, and he held forth in such a gloomy fashion upon the wonders that were within reach that the Professor almost forgot his injuries and his animus against Holman as he listened to the description.
"It is my opinion that the island was the burial ground of the chiefs of the nearby groups," remarked Leith. "There is every indication that the people who were buried here were not ordinary people, as you will see when you view the wonders that will meet your eyes to-morrow." ”