"Cold Blow," which succeeds to Little Hell, is a tremendous transition, and well deserves its name, perched as it is on the shivery, bare, and windy heights that lead to Burgh Heath and Banstead Downs "famous," says an annotated map of 1716, "for its wholesome Air, once prescribed by Physicians as the Patients' last refuge." The feudal-looking wrought-iron gates newly built beside the road here, surmounted by a gorgeous shield of arms crested with a helmet and enveloped in mantling, form the entrance to Nork Park, the seat of one of the Colman family, who have mustered very strongly in Surrey of late years.
At the right-hand turning, in midst of a group of fir-trees, stands the prehistoric tumulus known to the rustics as "Tumble Beacon." "Tumble" is probably the rural version of "tumulus."
Beyond this point, on a site now occupied by a cottage, stood the once-famed "Tangier" inn. Originally a private residence, the seat of Admiral Buckle,[10] who named it "Tangier," in memory of his cruises on the north coast of Africa, it became a house of call for coaches, and especially for post-chaises. Here, we are told, George the Fourth invariably halted for a glass of Miss Jeal's celebrated "alderbury"--that is to say elderberry-wine--"roking hot," to keep out the piercing cold, and Miss Jeal brought it forth with her own fair hands. Other travellers, who were merely persons, and not personages, had to be content with the less fair hands of the waiter.
The "Tangier" was burnt down about 1874. For some years after its destruction a platform that led from the house to the roadside, on a level with the floors of the coaches and post-chaises, survived; but only the cellars now remain. The woods at the back are, however, still locally known as "Tangier Woods."
Burgh Heath, at the summit of these downs, is a curious place called usually "Borough" Heath: it is in Domesday "Berge." As its name not obscurely hints, and the half-obliterated barrows show, it is a place of ancient habitation and sepulture; but nowadays it is chiefly remarkable for the descendants of the original squatters of about a century ago, who, braving the cold of these heights, settled on what was then an exceedingly lonely heath and stole whatever land they pleased. That was the origin of the hamlet of Burgh Heath. The descendants of those filibusters have in most cases rebuilt the original hovels, but it is still a somewhat forlorn place, made sordid by the tumbledown pigsties and sheds on the heath in which they have acquired a prescriptive freehold.