reduced this area, that in 1871, when the London Corporation interfered to preserve it, the Forest land unenclosed had dwindled down to 3,400

acres.

The citizens of London and the freeholders of Essex have from time immemorial held certain rights in Epping Forest, and it is the recognition, and, if we may use the word here, modernising of those rights, which gave the Lord Mayor and City Corporation a locus standi in their efforts to snatch from the bonds of the encloser and builder what now remains of this once extensive forest. One of the rights possessed by the citizens of London was derived from a privilege granted in 1226, which accorded free permission to hunt the Forest once every year, namely at Easter. In the olden times this was celebrated by a grand hunt in state, led by the Lord Mayor and City magnates, who were followed by a large number of the principal burgesses. The hunt was for many generations conducted with due ceremony and much civic display. But by the beginning of the last century, the Epping hunt had degenerated into a vulgar and ribald rout. Though it has been kept up, more or less, until quite recently, the annual custom became in

late years quite a nuisance, while the cruel practices connected with the chase of tame stags by an unruly rabble, led the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals to move the authorities to interfere and put a stop to the more disgraceful scenes which attended the event. Very stringent bye-laws have lately been passed prohibiting the shooting or trapping of wild creatures in the Forest; but the Board of Conservators, who have now the management of it, have the right to direct a certain number of bucks to be shot each year, and the venison is distributed among neighbouring landed proprietors whose hunting rights are so commuted.

Another popular right in connection with this forest was vested in the freeholders of Essex. They had the privilege of electing certain Verderers to watch over its affairs, and safeguard the interests of the inhabitants of the county in connection therewith. There were usually four Verderers elected, who, with the Grand Warden, appointed by the Crown, and Lieutenant or Deputy Warden, constituted the Forest Court for the trial of offenders against the Forest Laws. One of the Verderers was usually the Member of Parliament for the county. The date of the last

regular election of Verderers by the Essex freeholders, appears to have been 1816, after which time the Forest Court, as formerly constituted, gradually fell into desuetude, the freeholders losing, at least for the time being, their right to elect Verderers by ceasing to exercise it. In the days when this Sylvan tribunal discharged its duly appointed functions, Epping Forest was divided into ten sections or "walks," to each of which a master keeper was appointed. While this Forest Court existed, popular rights in the Forest were, after a fashion, maintained, notwithstanding the severity of the laws it had to administer. Since the Court has ceased to exist, many encroachments by the Lords of the Manors bordering on the Forest, and other landowners, have been made. But further encroachments have now, happily, been stopped by recent measures for the preservation of the Forest as a place of popular resort.

Among the privileges which the inhabitants of the parishes in which the Forest was situated enjoyed in the old days was that of pasturage for their cattle within the Forest precincts. Indeed, the woodland was, subject to certain Crown rights, treated very

much as an ordinary common, so far as the residents in and about its confines were concerned. One limitation of the rights of commonage, however, was that the inhabitants were obliged to drive home their cattle in what was called "the fence month," in order that the king's deer might have "feed and protection." The "fence month was fifteen days before and fifteen after old Midsummer Day.

Yet another right of the inhabitants of parishes within Forest bounds was that of "estovers," or "liberty of cutting wood sufficient for their firing," on the Forest wastes. A regulation in connection therewith, which appears to have been imposed on certain of the parishes, though not all, was that only so much wood could be cut each time as could be drawn away "on a sledge only, with two horses." All who are familiar with Epping Forest will have noticed the dwarfed or truncated appearance of many of the trees. This is due to the free exercise of this right of "estovers." The trees are for the most part "pollard," or "polled," oaks and beeches ; the frequent loppings of the branches for fuel, and of the topmost branches more particularly, having stunted their growth.

Epping being a "Royal" forest, it was originally in the private possession of the Crown. Many of the rights the inhabitants enjoyed, some of which we have mentioned, but which in recent years gradually passed away from them, being either forfeited or filched, were the gifts of different sovereigns. There was a royal palace. at Havering, which was demolished in the time of the Commonwealth. Queen Elizabeth was one of the sovereigns who were fond of visiting Havering Palace for the purpose of enjoying a hunt in Epping Forest. She had also a lodge situated between Chingford and Fair Mead Bottom, High Beach, which still exists, in a more or less "restored" form, and bears the name of Queen Elizabeth's Hunting Lodge. To this place she was very partial, and often resided there. The "Maiden Queen" very freely granted the privilege of wood cutting to the poor of the parishes contiguous to her residence, viz., Loughton, Thoydon Bois, Waltham Abbey, and Epping. But she appointed a rather curious rule to be observed for the maintenance of the right so granted. The possessors of the privilege were required each year to strike axe into the boughs of the trees at midnight of the 11th