The Brighton road : the classic highway to the south . th her wisheswas possible. XXXI And now to trace the Hickstead and Bolney routefrom Hand Cross, that parting of the ways overlookingthe most rural parts of Sussex. Hand Cross, it hasalready been said, is in the parish of Slaugham, whichlies deep down in a very sequestered wood, where thehead-springs issuing from the hillsides are never dryand the air is always heavy with moisture. Slougham-cum-Crole is the title of the place inancient records, Crole being Crawley. It was fromits ancient bogs and morasses that it obtained itsname, pronounce
The Brighton road : the classic highway to the south . th her wisheswas possible. XXXI And now to trace the Hickstead and Bolney routefrom Hand Cross, that parting of the ways overlookingthe most rural parts of Sussex. Hand Cross, it hasalready been said, is in the parish of Slaugham, whichlies deep down in a very sequestered wood, where thehead-springs issuing from the hillsides are never dryand the air is always heavy with moisture. Slougham-cum-Crole is the title of the place inancient records, Crole being Crawley. It was fromits ancient bogs and morasses that it obtained itsname, pronounced by the natives Slaffam, and itwas certainly due to them that the magnificent manor-house—almost a palace—of the Coverts, the old lordsof the manor—was deserted and began to fall to piecesso soon as built. The Coverts, now and long since utterly extinct,were once among the most powerful, as they were alsoamong the noblest, in the county. They were ofNorman descent, and, to use a well-worn phrase, came over with the Conqueror ; but they are not. 240 THE BRIGHTON ROAD found settled here until towards the close of thefifteenth century, being preceded, as lords of the manor,by the Poynings of Poynings, and by the Berkeleysand Stanleys. Sir Walter Covert, to whose ancestorsthe manor fell by marriage, was the builder of thatSlaugham Place whose ruins yet remain to show hisidea of what was due to a landed proprietor of hisstanding. They cover, within their enclosing walls ofred brick, which rise from the yet partly filled moat,over three acres of what is now orchard and meadow-land. In spring the apple trees bloom pink and whiteamid the grey and lichen-stained ashlar of the ruinedwalls and arches of Palladian architecture, and thelush grass grows tall around the cold hearths of theroofless rooms. The noble gateway leads now, notfrom courtyard to hall, but doorless, with its massivestones wrenched apart by clinging ivy, stands merelyas some sort of key to the enigma of ground pl
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, booksubjecthorses, bookyear1922
