you approach Hampstead: though bricks and
mortar, those friends to, fresh air when they
develop themselves in the form of healthy,
lofty lodging-houses in crowded cities—those
enemies to it, when they trench upon our
few beautiful fields—are rapidly doing mischief.
For a long time, a miserable, one-roomed
attempt, with two windows and a
door (associated only with conventional
dwellings of witches, and modern twopenny
table-beer) was the only attempt at " enclosure,"
and the cows and the people had it all
to themselves. But now, promising building-leases
are announced in all directions; more
than one attempt at a saw-pit has been
realised; and a few brick "skeletons" threaten
future villas, streets, "places," and terraces.
This is to be deplored—to be withstood. All
the beauty of Hampstead Fields depends upon
the openness of the surrounding prospect, and
it needs no professor of optics to prove how
little, houses contribute to opening out a
landscape.

Keeping gently north-west, we come to a
narrow lane, with comical palings on both
sides of every conceivable pattern. This is,
to our taste, the very prettiest entrance into
Hampstead. Although the houses are not
picturesque, they are the oldest in the place,
and their bright red bricks come out pleasantly
from among the rich trees. When
the sun is either setting, or at its full meridian,
the effect is glorious—just such an effect
as makes a great picture out of the simplest
and least pretending subject.

Leaving the " Vale," and passing the White
Horse—which, on certain occasions, clings
to entertainments, in which Ethiopian serenaders,
sack-jumping, greasy-poles, and races
performed by veteran washerwomen for a
"cup " of tea, never fail to draw crowded
audiences—we cross an enclosure, (which
calls up a mixture of something between
Paddington-Green and a parochial pound,)
and ascend the hill towards the Heath.

But to our taste; and, we believe, most
people's who know the neighbourhood; it is
far more pleasant to turn to the right of the
enclosure, pass the few cottages, which may
be remembered if it be only for the glorious
fuchsias which literally cover their parlour
windows, mount a conveniently-awkward,
or awkwardly-convenient, modern stile, and
run over Parliament and Constitution Hills.
But you must remember that you will then
get an excellent distant view of London. It
is well worth seeing, although it reminds us
how near we are.

We will suppose ourselves back again in
the old track, merely to look at the water-works
building, something like the Temple of
the Four Winds at Athens, with a monster
pomatum-pot (of the old " Civet Cat" pattern)
at top, and to catch the first glimpse of the
donkeys; for the donkey is as truly the indigenous
animal of Hampstead Heath, as is the
chamois of St. Bernard, the racoon of the
backwoods, and the blackbirds of the chandlers'
shops in the neighbourhood of Golden Square.

It is sad, for the cause of romance, to reflect
that these donkeys—the hired palfreys of holiday
misses, perpetually associated throughout
the summer with half-dozens of pretty,
fun-enjoying faces, rackety, good-humoured
laughter, enhanced by an occasional " spill,"
productive of more confusion and blushing
than danger—it is sad to think of these bullied,
stick-persuaded creatures degenerating, in
the winter, into despicable beasts of draught.
Pretty milliners, plump babies, and fast young
gentlemen, are faded from their memories;
and salt-fish, coals, and green stuff, are, for
the next seven months, their only topics of
reflection. We do not know, nevertheless,
whether they are not better off in the winter-time.
The costermongers are rough enough,
but the donkey-drivers are absolutely brutal.
Cab-driving and donkey-driving have many
points of resemblance, not the least marked of
which is their pleasing uncertainty respecting
fares. An hour's ride, or a half-hour's ride,
on Hampstead Heath, are the same facetious
fictions as eightpenny and one-and-four-penuy
fares are in London. Of a truth, donkey-drivers
know as little of practical arithmetic
as some bishops.

But we must not forget another animal
which is associated with the aboriginal (if
learned societies dispute the propriety of this
epithet, we cannot help it) donkeys of the Heath,
and that is the Hampstead Heath pony.
Captain Jumper's " History of the Horse,"
8vo, London, with seventy-four illustrations,
on steel, the " Winners of the Chalk Farm
Sweeps," 8vo, H. G. Besom and Son, Cork
Place, Hatton Garden, with fifty portraits of the
winners, give no idea of the animal in question.
It is not a mule; nor a cob, nor a Welsh colt,
nor a Shetland sheltie, nor a prad, nor a tit,
nor anything heard of either in the inn-yard,
or on the box. It is a deplorable instance
of the proverbial effects of mixing in bad
society. It is a something that might have
been a horse; but was thrown in early life
with imperfect education among donkeys,
and has learned all their tricks badly. Long
association has taught it to believe in thick
sticks, and despise the gentle switch; to
prefer outrageous shouting to the more refined
"cccckkkk; " and, without anything like a
spirited show of resistance, to make dead stops,
to walk zig-zag, to trot as if all the joints of
all its legs were broken, and to look humiliated
and miserable upon all occasions. It knows
but one rider, and that is the donkey boy.
Once we attempted a Hampstead Heath pony
ourselves, on the strength of considerable
experience of Oxford hacks and Kensington-kept
hunters. It was of no use. We edged
on a few paces, then turned round; then we
tried to munch the grass; then we looked as
if we were going to bolt; then we stuck down
our head; and, finally, we turned and went
back at a melancholy slow pace. When the