On either side Is level fen, a prospect wild and wide.
"LEVELS," or "brooks," is the name commonly given in Sussex to a number of grassy tracts, often of wide extent, which, though still in a state of semi-wildness, have been so far reclaimed from primitive fens as to afford a rough pasturage for horses and herds of cattle, the ground being drained and intersected by dikes and sluggish streams. In these spacious and unfrequented flats wildfowl of various kinds are often to be seen; herons stand motionless by the pools, or flap slowly away if disturbed in their meditation; pewits wheel and cry overhead; and the redshank, most clamorous of birds during the nesting-season, makes such a din as almost to distract the attention of the intruding botanist. For it is the botanist who is specially drawn to these wild water-ways, where hours may be profitably spent in strolling beside the brooks, with the certainty of seeing many interesting plants and the chance of finding some unfamiliar ones; nor is there anything to mar his enjoyment, except the possible meeting with a bull on a wide arena from which there is no ready exit, save by jumping a muddy ditch or by crossing one of the narrow and precarious planks which do duty as footbridges.
These "levels," though often bordering on a tidal river, are not themselves salt marshes, nor is their flora a maritime one; in that respect they differ from the East-coast fens described by Crabbe in one of his _Tales_, "The Lover's Journey"; a passage which has been praised as one of the best pictures ever given of dike-land scenery. There are lines in it which might be quoted of the Sussex as well as of the Suffolk marsh-meadows; but for me the verses are spoiled by the strangely apologetic tone which the poet assumed in speaking of the local plants:
The few dull flowers that o'er the place are spread Partake the nature of their fenny bed.
And so on. Did he think that his polite readers expected to hear of sweet peas and carnations beautifying the desolate mud-banks? The "dulness" seems to be--well, not on the part of the flowers. "Dull as ditchwater," they say. But ditchwater flowers are far from dull.
Of Sussex marshes the most extensive are the Pevensey Levels; but the most pleasantly situated are those that lie just south of Lewes, where the valley of the Ouse widens into an oval plain before it narrows again towards Newhaven. From the central part of this alluvial basin the view is very striking all around; for the estuary seems to be everywhere enclosed, except to seaward, by the great smooth slopes of the chalk Downs. On its west side are three picturesque villages, Iford, Rodmell, and Southease, with churches and farms lying on the very verge of the "brooks": at the head, the quaint old houses and castle of Lewes rise conspicuous like a mediæval town.