BARROWS AT HADDON FIELDS, DERBYSHIRE. 49 



skeleton, several of which appear to have been split for the sake 

 of the marrow, and two short tubular pieces (from the leg-bones 

 of sheep ?) which, to judge from their polished and worn surfaces, 

 must have been used as instruments of some sort. 



Although the cist was entirely removed, there can be no doubt, 

 not only of its existence the day before, but of its unusually care- 

 ful construction. The limestone slabs were, as a rule, very thin, 

 and well-shaped — -ranging from 18 to 26 or more inches in length, 

 and having no traces of trimming. The gritstone slabs were thicker, 

 and, as already remarked, foreign to the immediate district. 



No traces of pottery, or flint implements, were found. The iron 

 hook was turned up by the men ; but from what could be gathered 

 from them, it was not in the cist, and probably had nothing to do 

 with the interment. Although considerably rusted, it is not so much 

 so as one would expect, if it had been underground from the date of 

 the interment, — in fact, one has but to inspect the iron of the 

 Bateman collection at Sheffield to see the truth of this. It is said 

 that this Haddon Bank was a favourite gipsy camping-ground before 

 the enclosure ; and if this be so, it will furnish a reasonable 

 explanation of its presence. 



Thus the matter stood for several weeks — the iron hook figuring 

 meanwhile in the short newspaper notices as "the handle of a 

 sword " in one local paper, and as " part of a barrow," — the 

 correspondent evidently missing the exact nature of the barrow in 

 this case — in another. At length the writer accompanied the Doctor 

 to the site, when their attention was called to a fragment of a 

 quern (to be described in due course), amongst the debris of the 

 barrow ; and a closer inspection of the broken gritstone slabs brought 

 out the fact that they had been used for some purpose, — the surfaces 

 being worn smooth, and the edges rounded. This might be 

 attributed to "weathering," but it must be remembered that it is a 

 peculiarity of this stone that it either remains unaffected when 

 underground, or else perishes throughout its substance, thereby 

 becoming soft and crumbly. As an example of the former, the 

 writer noted a small gritstone slab (that probably had formed part of 

 the cist itself), as rough and sharp as if it had only just been 

 4 



