The time had come to fight. Within weeks the larger Forest landowners had met and formed a league - the New Forest Association. The Colonel had joined it, of course. So had one of the verderers, a Mr Eyre, whose family had extensive land in the northern Forest. Other families like the Drummonds, the Comptons of Minstead, and the lords of the old Bisterne estate were all ready to defend their heritage. Lord Henry, with the biggest estate of all, was a key member. There was also one most welcome addition to their number: a certain Mr Esdaile who had bought an estate at the dark old village of Burley some eighteen years before - a newcomer in Forest terms, therefore - but whose legal training made him invaluable. They had prepared a petition. The Office of Woods had been forced to pause. And now here they were, in the august setting of the House of Lords itself, fighting for the Forest.

'Colonel Albion.' Another peer, younger than the rest, addressed him now. 'May I ask you whether your fellow Commissioners, other than the three from the Office of Woods, are equally opposed to these inclosures?'

Albion stared at him gravely. He knew what this meant. Grockleton. Damn the man. Why the magistrate from Southampton should have decided to involve himself in Forest affairs he had never been sure, but some years ago he had purchased a hundred acres with commoning rights, and then got himself put on the Commission. He and the Deputy Surveyor seemed to agree about everything. As far as anyone could discover, Grockleton wanted to see the entire Forest as a huge commercial plantation without any humans in it at all.

'I could not say,' the Colonel answered calmly. 'Most, I believe, do; but it is not my place to speak for them.'

'I see. You make these complaints on behalf of the commoners in general, do you not? Of whom there are, in round terms, about a thousand?'

'Commoning rights vary. I believe that there are well over a thousand households with rights of one kind or another.'

'Yet,' the young peer had a little glint of triumph in his eye now, 'isn't it the members of the New Forest Association, the main landowners like yourself, who have most to lose or gain in this?'

That was it: the Colonel saw it clear as day. Cumberbatch and Grockleton had got at this young peer. For this was always the line taken by the Office of Woods: if you opposed them, you must be doing it out of self-interest. He smiled sweetly.