110
THE COMING OF AGE OF
the Forest district, all expressing approval of the action of the
Conservators. The two memorials were presented by me at a
meeting of the Epping Forest Committee on May 10th, 1895,
the deputation having been introduced by Mr. Andrew Johnston,
and having consisted of several representatives of the Club in
addition to Mr. Joslin, the High Sheriff of Essex, and Sir Robert
Hunter. The outcome of this second agitation was the appoint-
ment by the Corporation of a second Commission of inquiry by
the same experts, and their report was presented in November,
1895. This second report practically endorses their first, and
has convinced the public that no danger need be apprehended
from the action of the Conservators. The memorials and the
final report of the experts will be found in the Essex Natural-
ist (IX., 74-80) and in the same volume Mr. Edward North
Buxton published his views concerning the principles governing
the management of the woodland in the Forest (pp. 233—236).
On many occasions since the decisive meeting of 1894 have we
given our members opportunities of seeing for themselves the
actual results of the judicious attempts of the Conservators to
naturalise that tract of most unnaturally pollarded woodland
which was committed to their care by the Epping Forest Act of
1878. That their policy was sound and that their efforts have
been and are being crowned with all the success that can be
reasonably expected is amply justified by the present condition
of the Forest. There remains much to be done to insure its
perpetuation as a forest for the generations to come, since there
are still very serious dangers threatening the growth of the new
vegetation from which is to be developed the forest of the
future. But this address deals rather with the past than with
the future, and any expression of opinion concerning methods
that may yet have to be adopted would be out of place on the
present occasion.
In one other respect since the dedication of the Forest in
1882 have we reason to rejoice in the association of the Buxtons
with that district. In that year some twelve acres of land known
as the Oakhill Enclosure on the Theydon Road were threatened
by the builder, and attention was called to this danger by our
Secretary (Proc. III., xi.) In May, 1889 the Lord Mayor of
London, at a dinner of the Epping Forest Committee, read a
letter from Sir T. Fowell Buxton which practically amounted to
an announcement that he and his brother, Mr. E. N. Buxton, has