lie on the northern road, if only because of the woods about
them and the clear trout stream that runs under their walls and bridges.
The villages north of the ridge hardly have a good-sized pond between
them. But the walk from Guildford to Leatherhead, which can be shortened
at any railway station you please from Clandon to Bookham, is for all
that a walk through delightful country and villages of unchanging quiet.

Merrow is the first of the little hamlets that dot the Leatherhead road,
and though the Guildford villas are stretching out their gardens further
and further to the polite east, Merrow is still a mere group of downside
cottages. The church might have been better restored; but the chief
feature of the village is the old Horse and Groom Inn, with its gabled
front and its noble stack of chimneys, three sister shafts of peculiar
grace and mellow colour. The date, 1615, which records the age of the
inn above one of its bay windows, reads a reproach to the aggressively
modern porch and doors; and the white rough-cast with which the walls
are covered apparently conceals admirable timber and herringbone
brickwork. But the roof and the gables and windows still belong to an
inn and not a public-house, and the Horse and Groom too, swings a good
sign, vigorously drawn, of a prancing steed. Most of the signs of the
many White Horse and Black Horse inns are more like rocking-horses than
racers.

[Illustration: _Merrow._]

Above Merrow stretches some of the most perfect downland in England. If
the Sussex downs by Rottingdean inspired Mr. Kipling to his finest
poetry, the Surrey downs by Merrow taught him some of the most haunting
lines of all. I quote from eleven stanzas that ought not to be
separated:--

MERROW DOWN

There runs a road by Merrow Down--
A grassy track to-day it is
An hour out of Guildford town,
Above the river Wey it is.

Here, when they heard the horse-bells ring,
The ancient Britons dressed and rode
To watch the dark Phoenicians bring
Their goods along the Western Road.

But long and long before that time
(When bison used to roam on it)
Did Taffy and her Daddy climb
That down, and had their home on it.

The Wey, that Taffy called Wagai,
Was more than six times bigger then;
And all the Tribe of Tegumai
They cut a noble figure then!

Of all the Tribe of Tegumai
Who cut that figure, none remain--