North Downs

“ Those who best know the Downs and have lived among them all their lives can testify how, for a whole day’s march, one may never meet a man’s face; or if one meets it, it will be the face of some shepherd who may be standing lonely with his dog beside him upon the flank of the green hill and with his flock scattered all around. The isolation of these summits is the more remarkable from the pressure of population which is growing so rapidly to the south of them, and which is beginning to threaten the Weald to their north. ”

“ The down, or sheep-walk, is a pleasing, park-like spot, of about one mile by half that space, jutting out on the verge of the hill-country, where it begins to break down into the plains, and commanding a very engaging view, being an assemblage of hill, dale, wood-lands, heath, and water. The prospect is bounded to the south-east and east by the vast range of mountains called the Sussex Downs, by Guild-down near Guildford, and by the Downs round Dorking, and Ryegate in Surrey, to the north-east, which altogether, with the country beyond Alton and Farnham, form a noble and extensive outline. ”

“ The elevation now begins to decrease, and 682 ft. is the extreme height east of the Medway. The direction, hitherto E. by N., trends E.S.E. The final complete breach is made by the Great Stour, between Ashford and Canterbury, east of which a height of 600 ft. is rarely reached. The valley of the Little Stour, however, offers a well-marked pass followed by the Folkestone-Canterbury railway, and the North Downs finally fall to the sea in the grand white cliffs between Dover and Folkestone.
The South Downs present similar characteristics on a minor scale. ”

“ They brought their stock by the Burnett, the Dawson, and Springsure, over the Expedition Range. There was the usual trouble with the blacks after settling down. The natives killed the shepherds and robbed the huts of rations and cooking utensils that were very difficult to replace in those days. The Peak Downs was first reported on by Dr. Leichhardt, but many years elapsed before occupation set in. Among those who were prominent in the opening up and early settlement of the fine tableland of Peak Downs, with its rich soil, were De Satge and Milford, of Wolfang; Mackay, of Huntley ”

“ The "prospects," as such, are immeasurably superior to those obtainable from most of the mountains of the north and west, where a distant view is rare by reason of the surrounding chain of heights, and where the chance of any view at all to reward the climber is remote unless he chooses that fortnight in early June or late September when the peaks are usually unshrouded. Really bad weather, long continued, is uncommon in the Down country. ”

“ The question as to which is the finest section of the Downs must be left to the individual explorer. To some natures the free bare wind-swept expanse at the back of Brighton will appeal the most. By others the secret woods which climb from hidden combe and dry gully, mostly terminating in a bare top, and which are all west of the Arun, will be considered incomparably the best. To every man of Lewes the isolated mass of hills which rise on the east of the town are the Downs. But all must be seen to be truly appreciated and loved as they will be loved. ”

“ There are few districts in England and certainly none south of the Trent where old customs and queer legends persist with so much vitality as in these lonely combes and hollows. The effect of being out of the world is perhaps enhanced in these western Downs by the ring fence of dark woods through which we have to pass to reach the bare, wind-swept solitudes and lonely hamlets within them. The northern escarpment and southern flanks of the hills are clothed in vast forests of beech which add that grandeur to the great ramparts of chalk which the eastern ranges lack. ”

“ ON the strip of No Man's Land where sea and township pledged each other in cocoanut-husks, empty meat-tins, seaweed, fruit-rinds, and broken coral from the Great Barrier Reef, North was watching his tar-pot bubble and smoke on a driftwood fire that burned white in white sunshine. The still heat of a Queensland summer rose at him from the sand and weighted the air. The soundless sea, where a pearling-lugger rode with reefed sails, was like oil. ”

“ The tree that I planted on the grave-mound of my father—can it be that it lives now? Why do I linger in distant waves, taking tribute and conquering in war? My soul despises the glittering gold, and enough have I of renown.
"There's a flag on the mast and it points to the north, in
the north is the land I hold dear;
I will follow the course of the heavenly winds, and back
to the Northland I'll steer."
To his foster-brother Frithiof said: "Bjorn, I am weary of riding the sea. My heart longs for the firm earth of the Northland, and her lofty mountains are calling to me. ”

“ For two weeks an early spring had been working its miracle of change in that wonderful country of the northland between Jackson's Knee and the Shamattawa River, and from north to south between God's Lake and the Churchill.
It was a splendid world. From the tall pinnacle of rock on which they stood it looked like a great sea of sunlight, with only here and there patches of white snow where the winter winds had piled it deep. Their ridge rose up out of a great valley. ”

“ Not better; but the Downs are as good. They are as full of colour as the river—brown, green, black, in certain aspects very nearly red. It is wonderful to see the sunshine moving over them; the long shadows changing their positions during the afternoon, revealing unexpected projections of the ground. It is the Downs, I suppose, that draw people to the place; no celebrity lives there, there is no artistic colony, no local industry; it has not been written up by the Sussex Cyder School. And yet there are enough visitors to support a really quite tolerable hotel. ”

“ Making a good recovery, he set off in May to sledge across North Greenland through snow and over it, and over snow-arched crevasses, often, in cloudy weather, travelling in grey space with nothing visible beyond a foot or two around him. After fifty-seven days' journey to the north-east and along Peary Channel, the northern boundary of the mainland, he left the inland ice for a strange country dotted with snowdrifts and mostly of red sandstone, in which murmuring streams, roaring waterfalls, and the song of snow-buntings formed an agreeable change from the silence of the desert of snow. ”

“ I drew rein a moment on the ridge, and looked wistfully back along the forest trail.
Before me spread civilization and the waters of the Pacific; behind me, vague and vast,337 lay a hundred memories of the Wild North Land.
* * * * *
For many reasons it is fitting to end this story here. Between the ridge on the west shore of the Frazer and those scattered wooden houses on the east, lies a gulf wider than a score of valleys. On one side man—on the other the wilderness; on one side noise of steam and hammer—on the other voice of wild things and the silence of the solitude. ”

“ Hundreds upon hundreds of miles that endless trail went winding to the farthest North-west. No human being had ever trod its lengths before, though Indians or a stray Hudson's Bay Company man had made journeys over part of it during the years that have passed since Prince Rupert sent his adventurers to dot that northern land with posts and forts, and trace fine arteries of civilisation through the wastes. ”

“ The Australians themselves do not seem to know very much more about the Northern Territory than the average Englishman. They speak of it as an arid wilderness, much in the same way as they regard Western Australia; yet, to the visitor from home, it is the beauty and the wildness of Western and Northern Australia, that make an appeal far more profound than that of the busy, civilised, and comparatively populous southern and eastern states. With all their differences they are still too much like home to stir the imagination. ”

“ The old fort known as Dunvegan lies twelve long winter days’ travel to the south-west, and to reach it even in that time requires sustained and arduous exertion.
For 200 miles above Vermilion the course of the Peace River is north-west; it winds in long, serpentine curves between banks which gradually become more lofty as the traveller ascends the stream. To cut the long curve to the south by an overland portage now became our work; and for three days we followed a trail through mingled172 prairie and forest-land, all lying deep in snow. Four trains of dogs now formed our line. ”

“ Outside the ropes, at the foot of the huge green wave of the Downs, were the merry-go-rounds, the cocoanut-shies and wagons of the gypsies; while under a group of elms the carts and carriages of the local farmers and gentry were drawn up. ”

“ If the Northwest be plain like a picture in your mind’s eye, you can recall how in the far North the Cascades and Rockies are intermingled, and how, as we come down through British Columbia to our own soil, they gradually separate, slope apart, so that by the time they reach the latitude of Portland, Oregon, a wide, flat domain lies between them. ”

“ It is needless to dwell on the history of the dark days of bondage and weakly infancy, which has little to do with the early days of settlement in North Queensland, except to show the starting point. The North is free from the stain and drag of convictism. The real life of the colony began with the first days [Pg 6] of free settlers, then immigrants poured in rapidly, and the occupation of the interior advanced. With this strong growth of material progress, came also the desire for self-government, and separation from New South Wales. ”

“ The Downs have a human and historic as well as scenic interest. On many of their highest points are the barrows or graves of our British ancestors, who, could they revisit the glimpses of the moon, would find little change, for these hills have been less interfered with than any district within twice the distance from London. The English dislike of climbing has saved them. They will probably be the last stronghold of the horse when petrol has ousted him from every other region. ”

“ A Downland road can be taken from here to Friston, Eastdean and Eastbourne, saving some miles of up and down walking, but the most enjoyable though more strenuous route is by the cliff path from Cuckmere Haven over the "Seven Sisters" cliffs to Beachy Head; a glorious six miles with the sea on one side and the Downs on the other, culminating in the finest headland on the south coast, 575 feet high, the magnificent end of the Downs in the sea. All these cliffs provide nesting-places for wild birds. ”

“ Westward the sun hung like a red shield, close to the horizon, over vast reaches of prairie billowing to the sky-line in the tide of a boundless ocean. Such was the discovery of the Canadian Northwest.
Doubtless the weary gaze of the tired voyageurs turned longingly westward. Where was the Western Sea? Did it lie just beyond the horizon where skyline and prairie met, or did the trail of their quest run on—on—on—endlessly? The Assiniboine flows into the Red, the Red into Lake Winnipeg, the Lake into Hudson Bay. Plainly, Assiniboine Valley was not the way to the Western Sea. ”

“ Neither Nordland nor Finmark see the sun for many months in the year, and the difficulties and dangers of the road shut them out from intercourse with the southern world. The spirit of the North Pole rests oppressively over this region, and when in still August nights it breathes from hence over southern Norway, then withers the half-ripened harvests of the valleys and the plains, and the icy-grey face of hunger stares stiffly from the northern cliffs upon laborious but unhappy human multitudes. ”

“ As a centre for the exploration of East Sussex Lewes has no equal; days may be spent before the interest of the immediate neighbourhood is exhausted; for those who are vigorous enough for hill rambling the paths over the Downs are dry and passable in all weathers, and the Downs themselves, even apart from the added interest of ancient church or picturesque farm and manor, are ample recompense for the small toil involved in their exploration. ”

“ Those employed on stations as stockriders and horse-hunters become very useful and clever at the business, having a special aptitude for working among stock, and they are, as a rule, well treated, clothed, and fed. The Northern Peninsula up to Cape York is the only territory in Queensland where the natives may still be found in their original state, and on some of the rivers flowing into the Gulf they are still numerous. ”

“ At its worst, however, the eastern region may claim to be serviceable to the lover of scenery as well as to the sheep-farmer. Its thinly-grassed slopes, bare rocks, and fan-shaped shingle-slips furnish, at any rate, a foil to the grandeur of the central range and the luxuriance of the west. It is, indeed, not easy to believe that such glaciers and passes, such lakes and sea-gulfs, lie beyond the stern barrier, and the enjoyment, when wonderland is penetrated, is all the greater. ”

“ He believed that there were still settlements on the inaccessible east coast of Greenland where descendants of the old Northmen lived, cut off from all the world, sunk into ignorance and godlessness,—men and women who had once known the true light,—and his heart yearned to go to their rescue. ”

“ The North Foreland—Ramsgate—Deal—Dover—Hythe, and some other Cinque Ports The great headland, famous as the North Foreland, dazzling white on a bright summer’s day, and grey when the weather is cloudy; capped with green turf which is by turns, according to the season, the greenest and the least green in England, is familiar to all who have gone down Channel from the Thames estuary, and to many who have only crossed it. ”