s--Bad travelling--Ringmer and Gilbert White.

One of the pleasantest short walks from Lewes takes one over Mount
Caburn to Glynde, from Glynde to Ringmer, and from Ringmer over the
hills to Lewes again.

The path to Mount Caburn winds upward just beyond the turn of the road
to Glynde, under the Cliffe. Caburn is not one of the highest of the
Downs (a mere 490 feet, whereas Firle Beacon across the valley is
upwards of 700): but it is one of the friendliest of them, for on its
very summit is a deep grassy hollow (relic of ancient British
fortification) where on the windiest day one may rest in that perfect
peace that comes only after climbing. Caburn is not unique in this
respect; there is, for example, a similar hollow in the hill above
Kingly Vale; but Caburn has a deeper cavity than any other that I can
recall. On the roughest day, thus cupped, one may hear, almost see, the
gale go by overhead; and on such a mild spring day as that when I was
last there, towards the end of April, there is no such place in which to
lie and listen to the lark. If one were asked to name an employment
consistent with perfect idleness it would be difficult to suggest a
better than that of watching a lark melting out of sight into the sky,
and then finding it again. This you may do in Caburn's hollow as
nowhere else. The song of the lark thus followed by eye and ear--for
song and bird become one--passes naturally into the music of the
spheres: there exist in the universe only yourself and this cosmic
twitter.

The Lewes golfers, of both sexes, pursue their sport some way towards
Caburn, and in the valley below the volunteers fire at their butts; but
I doubt if the mountain proper will ever be tamed. Picnics are held on
the summit on fine summer days, but for the greater part of the year it
belongs to the horseman, the shepherd and the lark.

Mount Caburn gave its title to a poem by William Hay, of Glyndebourne
House, in 1730, which ends with these lines, in the manner of an
epitaph, upon their author:

Here liv'd the Man, who to these fair Retreats
First drew the Muses from their ancient Seats:
Tho' low his Thought, tho' impotent his Strain,
Yet let me never of his Song complain;
For this the fruitless Labour recommends,
He lov'd his native Country, and his Friends.

William Hay (1695-1755) was author also of a curious Essay on Deformity,
which Charles Lamb liked, and of several philosophical work