remains, in all
essential points of character, unchanged to this day: certain Gothic
splendours, lately indulged in by our wealthier neighbours, being the
only serious innovations; and these are so graciously concealed by the
fine trees of their grounds, that the passing viator remains unappalled
by them; and I can still walk up and down the piece of road between the
Fox tavern and the Herne Hill station, imagining myself four years old.

Our house was the northernmost of a group which stand accurately on the
top or dome of the hill, where the ground is for a small space level, as
the snows are, (I understand), on the dome of Mont Blanc; presently
falling, however, in what may be, in the London clay formation,
considered a precipitous slope, to our valley of Chamouni (or of
Dulwich) on the east; and with a softer descent into Cold Harbor lane on
the west: on the south, no less beautifully declining to the dale of the
Effra, (doubtless shortened from Effrena, signifying the "Unbridled"
river; recently, I regret to say, bricked over for the convenience of
Mr. Biffin, chemist, and others); while on the north, prolonged indeed
with slight depression some half mile or so, and receiving, in the
parish of Lambeth, the chivalric title of "Champion Hill," it plunges
down at last to efface itself in the plains of Peckham, and the rural
barbarism of Goose Green.

The group, of which our house was the quarter, consisted of two
precisely similar partner-couples of houses, gardens and all to match;
still the two highest blocks of buildings seen from Norwood on the crest
of the ridge; so that the house itself, three-storied, with garrets
above, commanded, in those comparatively smokeless days, a very notable
view from its garret windows, of the Norwood hills on one side, and the
winter sunrise over them; and of the valley of the Thames on the other,
with Windsor telescopically clear in the distance, and Harrow,
conspicuous always in fine weather to open vision against the summer
sunset. It had front and back garden in sufficient proportion to its
size; the front, richly set with old evergreens, and well-grown lilac
and laburnum; the back, seventy yards long by twenty wide, renowned over
all the hill for its pears and apples, which had been chosen with
extreme care by our predecessor, (shame on me to forget the name of a
man to whom I owe so much!)--and possessing also a strong old mulberry
tree, a tall white-heart cherry tree, a bla