Grant Allen was another one of the eminent writers who moved to Hindhead during the Victorian period, lured by its fair weather and attractive views.
He was born in Canada in 1848 but moved to the UK in his teens and later studied at Merton College, Oxford. He travelled widely but returned to England in 1876 and became known for his scientific writings and other literary works. He moved to Hindhead just before the turn of the century and wrote the following in his book 'The British Barbarians':
I am writing in my study on a heather-clad hilltop. When I raise my eye from my sheet of foolscap, it falls upon miles and miles of broad open moorland. My window looks out upon unsullied nature. Everything around is fresh and clean and wholesome. Through the open casement, the scent of the pines blows in with the breeze from the neighbouring firwood. Keen airs sigh through the pine-needles. Grasshoppers chirp from deep tangles of bracken. The song of a skylark drops from the sky like soft rain in summer; in the evening, a nightjar croons to us his monotonously passionate love-wail from his perch on the gnarled boughs of the wind-swept larch that crowns the upland. But away below in the valley, as night draws on, a lurid glare reddens the north-eastern horizon. It marks the spot where the great wen of London heaves and festers. Up here on the free hills, the sharp air blows in upon us, limpid and clear from a thousand leagues of open ocean; down there in the crowded town, it stagnates and ferments, polluted with the diseases and vices of centuries.
He lived at 'The Croft' - which has now been renamed 'Forest House' - on Tilford Road. This is a private residence so I was not able to place the cache at the house but instead, chose a place almost opposite the drive and with plenty of parking. If you are interested, the house can be seen through the trees from the National Trust path that skirts the Punchbowl though (see waypoints).
Above: 'The Croft' Below: 'Forest House'
The final chapter of his book 'Hilda Wade' ('The Dead Man Who Spoke') was dictated to and completed by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, his friend, doctor and neighbour. Grant Allen died of liver cancer in his Hindhead home in 1899.
Further reading on Grant Allen:
https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1Yk2lm-562t5eb6AByrS-S_Qfp9m4eVtQrvn3s33bZd0/mobilebasic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Allen
https://oztypewriter.blogspot.com/2019/02/philosopher-evolutionist-socialist.html?m=1