The country is, however, not interesting: a dead level of dusty road and grass or arable land, broken only by hedges, dykes, white cottages, and the many homesteads within their ramparts of wind-swept elms.

Wheat and oats are the prevailing crops, still for the most part cut and bound by hand.

Of the villages in the centre of the peninsula Sidlesham is the most considerable, with its handsome square church tower and its huge red tide-mill, now silent and weather-worn, standing mournfully at the head of the dry harbour of Pagham, whose waters once turned its wheels.

On the west, on the shores of the Bosham estuary, or Chichester Harbour, are the sleepy amphibious villages of Appledram, famous once for its salt and its smugglers, Birdham, and Earnley.

Let no one be tempted to take a direct line across the fields from Selsey to Earnley, for dykes and canals must effectually stop him.
Indeed, cross country walking in this part of the country is practically an impossibility, except by continuous deviations and doublings.