THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
111
purchased the plot of land in question and had presented it to be
kept as part of the Forest for ever. This generous addition was
acknowledged by a resolution passed by the Club at the meeting
held at Writtle Park in that same month (Essex Naturalist III.,
57). Again, in 1890, Mr. Andrew Johnston announced at a meeting
held in Epping Forest on May 17th, that Sir Fowell and Mr.
E. N. Buxton and a relative had made an offer of contributing
towards a fund of £6,000 which was required for the acquisition
of a portion (over 30 acres) of Highams Park at Woodford (Ibid.
IV., 127). Of the total amount required the sum of £3,000 was
provided by the Corporation of London, and of the £3,000
which it was required to raise locally the Buxtons offered £1,800,
the remainder having been subsequently raised as set forth in the
history of this addition to the Forest printed in full in the Essex
Naturalist (V., 137). It was again the pleasant duty of the
Club in Dec, 1890, to pass a resolution thanking the Buxtons
for their munificent action in connection with this matter (Ibid.
IV., 230) and a meeting was held in March, 1891, to enable our
members to see this latest addition to the Forest (Ibid. V., 129).
Once again, in October, 1898, Mr. E. N. Buxton presented as a
further contribution to the Forest the picturesque elevation
known as Yardley Hill, an addition of some 28 acres in extent
(Ibid. XL, 78 ; see also p. 268). A meeting held in June, 1899,
enabled our members to realize the extent of public indebted-
ness to Mr. Buxton, to whom a vote of thanks was again
accorded on behalf of the Club (Ibid. XL, 129).4
A few papers concerning the history and topography of the
Forest district have been contributed to the Club, such, for
example, as Mr. W. C. Waller's notes on the old track from
London to Epping (Essex Naturalist VI, 206), on old
Loughton Hall (Ibid. VII., 14), on the Epping Hunt (Ibid.
VIII., 31), and on the Barclay-Johnston MSS. and Papers
relating to Epping Forest (Ibid. IX., 157), and Mr. I. C.
4 With reference to the history of the rescue of the Forest for the public, Mr. E. N.
Buxton writes to me under the date of February 27th :—" My services are as nothing to my
brother Fowell's. By backing up Willingale against the Lords of Manors long before the
City came in, and when the cause was unpopular, he not only did a thing which required the
highest moral courage, but without it there would have been no Forest to preserve. Single-
handed he arrested the wave of enclosures.....of the little bits I have been able to
add the Highams Park was the most difficult transaction and the most interesting." While
this Address was passing through the press it was announced at the Court of Common
Council that Mr. Gerald Buxton had purchased and presented as another addition to the
Forest, the greater part of Bell Common, Epping, and the waste land along the Ivy Chinmies
Road.