30 Mr. Henry Walker's Lecture:
device. Here, upon the south side of High-street, is
St. Mary's Hospital, an institution of venerable anti-
quity. We can only stay to hear that the hospital was
founded by an Abbess of Barking (temp. Stephen) for a
prior, a warden, two priests, and thirteen lepers. More,
we might learn, but the geologic mind seeks a greater anti-
quity than this. We leave St. Mary's Hospital to Lord
Salisbury, its present warden, and haste to join our fellow-
naturalists, who are far in advance on the Barking Road.
The plan of our expedition is now unfolded, and we
learn the designs of our leaders. In this Barking Road,
we meet Sir Antonio Brady, in whose preserves our game
is supposed to lie, and who has hunted the country for
years. Sir Antonio kindly brings his carriage for the
benefit of the fair huntresses who accompany our party.
Perchance a tame elephant or two, with houdahs, and
gorgeous caparisons, and swarthy turban-clad riders, are
not far off, and will take us to the jungle, or wherever our
destination may be. We are well furnished with guides.
Besides Sir Antonio, who has tracked a good hundred or
more of elephants to their home about Ilford in his time,
we have a skilled zoologist from the British Museum, one
who well knows the old-world fauna of the Thames Valley
and their hiding places.
The word is given by our leaders "To the Uphall Pits
on the Barking Road!" To the Uphall Pits on the Barking
Road we go. We have time to note the geography of the
district. The Barking Road, which runs due north and
south, goes down from Ilford towards the Thames, which
is about four miles away. The tributary River Roding, at a
little distance to our right, runs parallel with the Barking
Road. We are on the eastern slope of the Roding Valley.
Suddenly, through a narrow hedgerow gap, our leaders
disappear. The game must now be close at hand. Follow-
ing our leaders, we find ourselves all unprepared among
the celebrated Uphall elephant-pits. The flats along which
we have walked have reminded us of the rice and paddy
fields of Ceylon, but another vegetation here confronts us.
In Indian file we thread our way through ranks of well-