A diversion round by Burford Bridge would have taken the early
travellers far out of their way. Roughly speaking, they would have had
to go along two sides of an equilateral triangle instead of its base:
three miles for one and a half. Now, had they any reason to do this?
None that I can see. Wherever, in crossing a valley, the Old Road
diverges from its general alignment, it diverges either to avoid bad
soil or to find a ford. The name Burford would suggest to those who
have not carefully examined the river that this diversion might have
been made necessary in order to find a shoal at that point; but the
Mole is very unlike the other streams south of the Thames. It
disappears into 'swallows': it 'snouzles,' and there is a theory that
the river got its name from this habit of burrowing underground. At
almost any one of these numerous 'swallows' the river can quite easily
be crossed, and a considerable diminution of its stream, though
perhaps not a true 'swallow,' is to be found at the point I indicate.
Again, that all-important consideration in a new country--I mean the
dryness of the soil over which a road passes--was very much helped by
taking the more direct of the two lines. Ground with some slope to it,
and always fairly dry, comes here on either side, close to the river.
But down by Burford, on the western side, there is quite a little
plain, which must have been marshy, and for all I know, may be so
still. Moreover, we shall find further on at Otford, and at Snodland,
that the Old Road in crossing a valley always chooses a place where
some spur of high land leads down to the river and corresponds to a
dry rise immediately upon the other bank. Coupled with the fact that a
direction such as I suggest makes a natural link between the two
known parts of the road, being very nearly in one alignment with them,
and remembering that Burford Bridge was built in connection with a
very much later Roman way northward up the valley (it is evidently the
Bridge of the Stane Street), that its direction and the place at which
it crosses are obviously dependent on a north and south road, not on
an east and west one, we decided to approach the eastern bank, and to
see whether any existing trace of a road would support what seemed to
us the most tenable hypothesis.
It cannot be pretended that any very distinct evidence clinched what
remains, after all, our mere theory; but there was enough to convince
us, at least, and I believe to convince most people, who will do as we
did, and stand upon the Old Road at the base of Box Hill looking
towards Denbies on the other side of the valley. He will see,
following a very obvious course, a certain number of yews of great
age, remaining isolated in the new-ploughed land. These, leading
across the river, are continued at a very slight angle by a definite
alignment of three trees, equally isolated though far less old,
standing equally in comparatively modern cultivated land, and leading
directly to the place where the track is lost at its exit from Denbies
Park; and the whole line follows two spurs of land which approach the
river from either side.
A conclusion thus reached cannot pretend to such a value as I would
demand for the rest of our reconstructions: such as, for instance, can
legitimately be demanded for the way in which we filled the gap at
Puttenham. But it is far more convincing on the spot, and with the
evidence before one (such as it is), than any verbal description can
make it, and I would repeat that any one making the experiment with
his own eyes will be inclined to agree with us.
When we had arrived at this decision in the first hour of daylight we
turned eastward, and pursued our way by the raised and yew-lined track
which was now quite unmistakable, and which we could follow for a
considerable time without hesitation. It ran straight along the
300-feet contour-line, and took the southern edge of a wood called
Brockham Warren.
Here for a short way we went through a stately but abandoned avenue,
with the climbing woods up steep upon our left, and on our right a
little belt of cover, through which the fall of the slope below us and
the more distinct Weald and sandy hills could be seen in happy
glimpses. When we came out upon the further side and found the open
Down again, we had doubled (as it were) the Cape of Boxhill, and found
ourselves in a new division of the road.