to Hertfordshire and St.
Albans, Berks, Bucks, Oxfordshire, to Windsor Castle, St. Martha's
Chapel, Hampton Court, Kingston, Hampshire, etc." Eight counties is a
noble stretch of England. But to-day the view has lost most of its
grandeur. The hill has been thickly planted with trees, conifers for the
most part, and the view can only be had in peeps and patches. Forty or
fifty years ago, before the pines were planted, there stood on the hill
three sister elms, a proud mark for all the country round. One alone
remains, fenced in with iron and hollow, and still a splendid tree; but
her shade falls on altered ground. Before the middle of the last century
the level stretch of soil to the south was ploughland: it is now a level
mead of green, glowing with bordering rhododendrons in June, and bitten
close and smooth by rabbits. It is amusing to notice the fineness of the
turf within three or four yards of the rhododendrons all round the
green; the rabbits are "poor men," like Chuchundra, and afraid to come
out into the middle of the room.

Besides the ruins of St. Anne's Chapel, which is not very much to look
at, and at which very few look, there are two other relics on the hill.
One is a spring, welling up under an arch. It is still what Aubrey
describes it to be, "a fine clear spring dressed with squared stones,"
and up to within recent years the country folk round about have been
used to fetch away water from it, in the belief that it has virtues as
an eye lotion. It has a strong taste of iron; would that be good for the
eyes? Another curiosity is the so-called Devil's Stone, or Treasure
Stone. Aubrey calls this "a conglobation of gravel and sand," and says
that the inhabitants know it as "the Devil's Stone, and believe it
cannot be mov'd, and that treasure is hid underneath." There have been
many searchers after the treasure. One of them once dug down ten feet or
more, hoping to come to the base of the huge mass, but his task grew
unkinder as he got deeper, and he gave it up. He might well do so, for
what is pretty certain is that he was trying to dig up St. Anne's Hill.
All over the face of the hill there are masses of this hard pebbly
sandstone cropping up, though they are not so noticeable as the
so-called Devil's Stone because they are flat and occasionally
crumbling, and have not had their sides laid bare by energetic
treasure-seekers.

The view from the hill has not, of course, been wholly lost. To the
south the tr