[24] This was taken from the first edition of Mr. Langton's book, published in 1883. In the new edition, 1891—a beautiful volume—this passage has been eliminated, but the engraving is untouched.
[25] This house is appropriately named "Highland House," and was also the property of John Dickens's landlord, in which the family then and for many years after resided. At the time referred to Mr. Pearce owned not only the above-mentioned houses, but all the surrounding property.
[26] Lambarde says, "Malling, in Saxon Mealing, or Mealuing, that is, the Low place flourishing with Meal or Corne, for so it is everywhere accepted."
[27] The italics are interpolated.
[28] Burham, although now enshrouded in the smoke of lime-making, was probably sixty years ago a delightfully rural spot.
[29] Mr. Roach Smith reminded us that the yew was in times past planted for its wood to be used as bows.
[30] Professor Huxley, in his Physiography, has estimated that "at the present rate of wear and tear, denudation can have lowered the surface of the Thames Basin by hardly more than an inch since the Norman Conquest; and nearly a million years must elapse before the whole basin of the Thames will be worn down to the sea-level"; and Dr. A. Geikie, after a series of elaborate calculations, has postulated "as probably a fair average, a valley of 1000 feet deep may be excavated in 1,200,000 years." Taking these estimates as a basis, and allowing for an average height of three hundred feet, we roughly arrive at a period of about four hundred thousand years as the possible length of time which it has taken to form this beautiful valley. Professor Huxley may well say that "the geologist has thoughts of time and space to which the ordinary mind is a stranger."
[31] Mr. Kitton's illustration (from the painting by Gegan, a local artist, executed many years since) gives a good idea of the scenery of this beautiful district. It also reproduces the profile of a huge chalk cliff not now visible, but which existed about half a century ago, having a curious resemblance to the head of a lion, and forming at the time a conspicuous landmark to travellers.
[32] According to a "Note" in the Rochester and Chatham Journal, the derivation of this curious term is from uro to burn (ustus).
[33] One of the "Five Cinque Ports, and two Ancient Towns" often referred to, but not always remembered—Hastings, Sandwich, Dover, New Romney, Hythe, Winchelsea and Rye.