6
large extent; as if cattle could pass in freely, deer
could get out.
The worst of all this is, however, to come. They
propose to upset the law, and either to keep the hateful
enclosures of 760 acres (independent of the City
purchases) from the public, or buy them back at an
enormous price as building land, such price to be fixed
by private bargaining, or a nominee surveyor, and not
by the Lands' Clauses Act, or other handy law, with
whose decisions everybody is bound to be satisfied—an
unlikely event with the course proposed. Those who
may be pardoned for hesitating to believe this had
better buy the scheme : they can get it for 2s. 6d.
Trouble looms ahead ; a steadfast determination must
be come to to insist on the proper course of law, and
while not being too nice about a little curtilage to a
house, to have all Forest land valuable to the public at
once thrown open, and earn the fruits of a hard-won
victory.
The eminent Q.C., Mr. Fitzjames Stephen, who
argued on behalf of Mr. Shaw Lefevre, M.P., and myself,
absolutely puts it that this attempt to override the law
is entirely beyond the Commissioners' powers.
When the amended scheme comes out it will be again
my duty, undertaken at the Beaumont meeting many
years since, to lay the results before you. It would be
idle not to warn you that vigorous action may be
requisite.
My objections follow. They nearly copy or repeat
the clauses.
1, the undersigned George Burney, of Millwall, Tank
Manufacturer; Chairman of the Epping Forest
Preservation Society ; Member of the Commons
Preservation Society ; one of the Persons ap-
pointed at a Public Meeting at the Beaumont
Institution eleven years since ; and Commoner
of the Manor of Loughton, respectfully object
to the Draft Scheme of the Epping Forest
Commissioners on the following grounds: