1901-1902. | A Winter in Cornwall. 365 
dense masses of whin, bracken, &c., which cover up the for- 
mation. This old camp was utilised by the Parliamentary 
forces who opposed King Charles in 1644. In almost every 
instance all these prehistoric remains stand in wild and barren 
districts, far from towns and villages. In all likelihood those 
that existed elsewhere would be destroyed during the march 
of civilisation, as few are to be seen in the cultivated 
portions. 
Another most interesting antiquity, of which a few examples 
are still extant, is what, judging from the ruinous remains, is 
conjectured to have been a kind of village or settlement, con- 
sisting of rude stone huts communicating with each other by 
means of narrow passages. The two which I had the pleasure 
of examining were Chysoyster, and one near Caer Brane and 
Chapel Uny, whose name has escaped my memory,—the latter, 
if anything, better preserved than the former. The dense mass 
of vegetation that has been allowed to overgrow these struct- 
ures hides to a large extent the original ground-plan, and this 
again is a case of lack of interest on the part of the proprietors 
and the public generally. The expenditure of a moderate sum 
of money would go a long way towards clearing out the 
rubbish, and helping to preserve a few, at least, of these 
memorials, which in this progressive age are fast becoming 
a vanishing quantity. Some attempt at excavation has un- 
doubtedly taken place at the example near Caer Brane, 
and a few of the underground passages, roofed over with 
immense slabs after the style of the galleries in the 
Highland brochs, have been cleared out, as also a circular 
chamber, roofless now, whatever it may have been in its 
pristine state. Not far from this place is a fine specimen 
of the bee-hive shaped hut, probably used as a place of 
sepulture. : 
Holy wells must at one time have played an important 
part in the history of Cornwall, as divers instances of these 
may be discovered all over. Most of them were connected 
with baptisteries, more or less crumbling to ruin now, save 
where some philanthropic individual, or body of individuals, 
have stepped in and prevented further decay by a judicious 
tinkering up or rebuilding. Numberless were the marvellous 
cures of sundry complaints that were effected upon sufferers 
