prejudice this right." This principle, Hunter maintained, had been extended from old grazing rights to a modern requirement that common land should not be enclosed without due regard for "the health, comfort and convenience of the inhabitants" of nearby urban areas. The six essays were published in one volume in 1867. In the same year Hunter was admitted solicitor. He became a partner in Fawcett, Horne, and Hunter, solicitors to the recently established Commons Preservation Society. Commons Preservation Society Hunter worked with the society to save common land from enclosure. He instituted legal actions that ensured protection of Hampstead Heath, and Berkhamsted, Plumstead, Wimbledon and Tooting commons and other open spaces threatened with enclosure. Most of the principles of public interest expounded in his 1866 essay were incorporated into English law in 1875. From the latter year onwards, Hunter was Octavia Hill's adviser on the protection of open spaces in London. One of Hunter's most celebrated successes was the rescue from enclosure of 3,000 acres of Epping Forest, with the support of the corporation of the City of London. The case was bitterly contested across three years. Hunter acted with the corporation's solicitor, Sir Thomas Nelson, in the conduct of the legal proceedings. In 1882 Queen Victoria went to the forest and formally declared it "available for her people's enjoyment". Post Office A leading member of the Commons Preservation Society during this period was the Liberal politician Henry Fawcett. He was appointed Postmaster General by Gladstone in 1880. When the post of solicitor to the General Post Office (GPO) became vacant in 1881 Fawcett decided that Hunter would be the best choice for the position. Hunter's fitness for the post was confirmed by independent advisers and he was appointed on 1 February 1882. Fawcett later said that nothing in his official career had given him more satisfaction than securing a man of Hunter's character and ability for the service of the nation. Hunter remained as solicitor to the GPO until the year of his death. Much of his work was in preparing draft legislation on Post Office matters to be put before Parliament. There were more than fifty such drafts during Hunter's tenure. His biographer L W Chubb singles out the Conveyance of Mails Act, 1893, which established an arbitration procedure for disputes between the railway companies and the GPO about charges for transporting mail by train. Chubb calculates that