North Hampshire Downs
otherwise: Highclere Hills; Kingsclere Hills
The place is described in text Cobbett 1830
The land along here [between Andover and Weyhill] is very good. This whole country has a chalk bottom; but, in the valley on the right of the hill over which you go from Andover to Weyhill, the chalk lies far from the top, and the soil has few flints in it.
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Burghclere lies along at the foot of a part of that chain of hills, which, in this part, divide Hampshire from Berkshire. The parish just named is, indeed, in Hampshire, but it forms merely the foot of the Highclere and Kingsclere Hills. These hills, from which you can see all across the country, even to the Isle of Wight, are of chalk, and with them, towards the North, ends the chalk. The soil over which I have come to-day, is generally a stony sand upon a bed of gravel.
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... over the North Hampshire Hills, which, not withstanding their everlasting flints, I like very much. As you ride along even in a green lane the horses' feet make a noise like hammering. It seems as you were riding on a mass of iron. Yet the soil is good, and bears some of the best wheat in England. All these high, and indeed, all chalky lands, are excellent for sheep. But, on the top of some of these hills, there are as fine meadows as I ever saw. ...
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Quitting Whitchurch, I went off to the left out of the Winchester-road, got out upon the high-lands, took an 'observation,' as the sailors call it, and off I rode, in a straight line, over hedge and ditch, towards the rising ground between Stratton Park and Micheldever-Wood; ...
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And the singularity is, that this pasture is on the very tops of these lofty hills, from which you can see the Isle of Wight. There is a stiff loam, in some places twenty feet deep, on a bottom of chalk. Though the grass grows so finely there is no apparent wetness in the land. The wells are more than three hundred feet deep. The main part of the water, for all uses, comes from the clouds; and, indeed, these are pretty constant companions of these chalk hills, which are very often enveloped in clouds and wet, when it is sunshine down at Burghclere or Uphusband. They manure the land here by digging wells in the fields and bringing up the chalk, which they spread about on the land; and which, being free-chalk is reduced to powder by the frosts. A considerable portion of the land is covered with wood; and as, in the clearing of the land, the clearers followed the good soil, without regard to shape of fields, the forms of the woods are of endless variety, which, added to be never-ceasing inequalities of the surface of the whole, makes this, like all the others of the same description, a very pleasant country.
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This is my taste, and here, in the north of Hampshire, it has its full gratification. I like to look at the winding side of a great down, with two or three numerous flocks of sheep on it, belonging to different farms; and to see, lower down, the folds, in the fields, ready to receive them for the night. We had, when we got upon the downs, after leaving Winchester, this sort of country all the way to Whitchurch.
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... Of these 13 miles (from Winchester to Whitchurch) we rode about eight or nine upon the greensward, or over fields equally smooth. And, here is one great pleasure of living in countries of this sort: no sloughs, no ditches, no nasty dirty lanes, and the hedges, where there are any, are more for boundary marks than for fences. Fine for hunting and coursing: no impediments; no gates to open: nothing to impede the dogs, the horses, or the view. The water is not seen running; but the great bed of chalk holds it, and the sun draws it up for the benefit of the grass and the corn; and, whatever inconvenience is experienced from the necessity of deep wells, and of driving sheep and cattle far to water, is amply made up for by the goodness of the water, and by the complete absence of floods, of ditches and of water-furrows. As things are now, however, these countries have one great draw-back: the poor day labourers suffer from the want of fuel, and they have nothing but their bare pay. For these reasons they are greatly worse off than those of the woodland countries; and it is really surprising what a difference there is between the faces that you see here and the round, red faces that you see in the wealds and the forests, particularly in Sussex, where the labourers will have a meat-pudding of some sort or other; and where they will have a fire to sit by in the winter.
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WE came off from Burghclere yesterday after-noon, crossing Lord Caernarvon's park, going out of it on the west side of Beacon Hill, and sloping away to our right over the downs towards WOODCOTE. The afternoon was singularly beautiful. The downs (even the poorest of them) are perfectly green; the sheep on the downs look, this year, like fatting sheep; we came through a fine flock of ewes, and, looking round us, we saw, all at once, seven flocks, on different parts of the downs, each flock, on an average, containing at least 500 sheep.
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WE left Burghclere last evening, in the rain; but, as our distance was only about seven miles, the consequence was little. The crops of corn, except oats, have been very fine hereabouts; and, there are never any pease, nor any beans, grown here. The sainfoin fields, though on these high lands, and though the dry weather has been of such long continuance, look as green as watered meadows, and a great deal more brilliant and beautiful. I have often described this beautiful village (which lies in a deep dell) and its very variously shaped environs, in my Register of November, 1822. This is one of those countries of chalk and flint and dry-top soil and hard roads and high and bare hills and deep dells, with clumps of lofty trees, here and there, which are so many rookeries: this is one of those countries, or rather, approaching towards those countries, of downs and flocks of sheep, which I like so much, which I always get to when I can, and which many people seem to flee from as naturally as men flee from pestilence. They call such countries naked and barren, though they are, in the summer months, actually covered with meat and with corn.
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... From Whitchurch to within two miles of this place [Burghclere], it is the same sort of country as between Winchester and Whitchurch. High, chalk bottom, open downs or large fields, with here and there a farm-house in a dell, sheltered by lofty trees, which, to my taste, is the most pleasant situation in the world.
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In this North of Hampshire, as every where else, the churches and all other things exhibit indubitable marks of decay. There are along under the North side of that chain of hills, which divide Hampshire from Berkshire, in this part, taking into Hampshire about two or three miles wide of the low ground along under the chain, eleven churches along in a string in about fifteen miles, the chancels of which would contain a great many more than all the inhabitants, men, women, and children, sitting at their ease with plenty of room. ...
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In former RIDES, and especially in 1821 and 1822, I described very fully this part of Hampshire [Burghclere area]. The land is a chalk bottom, with a bed of reddish, stiff loam, full of flints, at top. In those parts where the bed of loam and flints is deep the land is arable or woods: where the bed of loam and flints is so shallow as to let the plough down to the chalk, the surface is downs. In the deep and long valleys, where there is constantly, or occasionally, a stream of water, the top soil is blackish, and the surface meadows. This has been the distribution from all antiquity, except that, in ancient times, part of that which is now downs and woods was corn-land, as we know from the marks of the plough. And yet the Scotch fellows would persuade us, that there was scarcely any inhabitants in England before it had the unspeakable happiness to be united to that fertile, warm, and hospitable country, where the people are so well off, that they are above having poor-rates!
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The tops of the hills here are as good corn-land as any other part; and it is all excellent corn-land, and the fields and woods singularly beautiful. Never was there what may be called a more hilly country, and all in use. Coming from Burghclere, you come up nearly a mile of steep hill, from the top of which you can see all over the country, even to the Isle of Wight; to your right a great part of Wiltshire; into Surrey on your left; and, turning round, you see, lying below you, the whole of Berkshire, great part of Oxfordshire, and part of Gloucestershire. This chain of lofty hills was a great favourite with Kings and rulers in ancient times.
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... [near Hurstbourne Tarrant] The lands, too, are pretty beyond description. These chains of hills make, below them, an endless number of lower hills, of varying shapes and sizes and aspects and of relative state as to each other; while the surface presents, in the size and form of the fields, in the woods, the hedge-rows, the sainfoin, the young wheat, the turnips, the tares, the fallows, the sheep-folds and the flocks, and, at every turn of your head, a fresh and different set of these; this surface all together presents that which I, at any rate, could look at with pleasure for ever. Not a sort of country that I like so well as when there are downs and a broader valley and more of meadow; but, a sort of country that I like next to that; for, here, as there, there are no ditches, no water-furrows, no dirt, and never any drought to cause inconvenience. The chalk is at bottom, and it takes care of all.
The crops of wheat have been very good here this year, and those of barley not very bad. The sainfoin has given a fine crop of the finest sort of hay in the world, and, this year, without a drop of wet.
The place is described in text Walton 1820s
- hill - Hampshire
enter the county near Farnborough, run in a westerly direction past Odiham, Basingstoke, and Kingsclere, and extend through the whole breadth of the county. The width of the range is from two to three miles. The highest point is Siddown Hill, 943 feet high, the loftiest ground in Hampshire. ...
