Page:Surrey Archaeological Collections Volume 7.djvu/125

 farm, but I am not aware that auy masonry of mediæval date is still to be discerned. There are two fireplaces of some antiquity among the ruins of the old house, which is known to have been enlarged and inhabited by the Brodrick family while Sir William Chambers was busy with the new house, and " Capability" Brown was laying out the new gardens of Peper Harow. Part of the adjoining cottage may be worth a brief inspection, but I suspect the ponds or fish-stews, with the causeway running between them, are the most ancient relics of Oxenford in the olden time.

If we must needs regret, as archæologists, that even at Oxenford, as at Peper Harow and elsewhere in this part of Surrey, we seek in vain for domestic architecture more than two centuries old, let us console ourselves with one reflection. The poverty of soil which discouraged the erection of great houses in this neighbourhood, and the abundance of natural timber which tempted our ancestors to build mansions of perishable materials, are the very causes which have protected the pristine beauty of our scenery, and which preserve for artists many a picturesque nook of Old England in the heart of Western Surrey. As we explore the undisturbed glades and heaths of Leith Hill, we tread the same upland pastures embosomed in the same forests which closed the view of Roman legions in their advance along the Stone-street from Chichester to London; as we look from the Hog's Back over the old Hundreds of Blackheath and Woking, Farnham and Godalming, our eyes rest on almost the same prospect which Earl Godwin pointed out to Alfred, son or Ethelred, on the eve of the Guildford massacre.