Old Hampshire Mapped
Cobbett's Hampshire
Transcription (90)Lyndhurst
Beaulieu
woods
beech
pig
Beaulieu River
Beaulieu Abbey
We therefore started, or, rather, turned away from Lyndhurst, as soon as we got back to it, and went about six miles over a heath, even worse than Bagshot-Heath; as barren as it is possible for land to be. A little before we came to the village of Beaulieu (which, observe, the people call Beuley), we went through a wood, chiefly of beech, and that beech seemingly destined to grow food for pigs, of which we saw, during this day, many, many thousand. I should think that we saw at least a hundred hogs to one deer. I stopped, at one time, and counted the hogs and pigs just round about me and they amounted to 140, all within 50 or 60 yards of my horse. After a very pleasant ride, on land without a stone in it, we came down to the Beaulieu river, the highest branch of which rises at the foot of the hill, about a mile and a half to the north-east of Lyndhurst. For a great part of the way down to Beaulieu it is a very insignificant stream. At last, however, augmented by springs from the different sand-hills, it becomes a little river, and has, on the sides of it, lands which were, formerly, very beautiful meadows. When it comes to the village of Beaulieu, it forms a large pond of a great many acres; and on the east side of this pond is the spot where this famous Abbey formerly stood, and where the external walls of which, or a large part of them, are now actually standing. We went down on the western side of the river. The Abbey stood, and the ruins stand, on the eastern side.
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