By the Rev. Edward Peacock. 265 



dyke would be dug, and this great mound thrown up, by a people 

 who had no implements to help them besides a pointed stick perhaps, 

 to loosen the soil, or a flint, attached by leathern thongs to a handle 

 to act as pickaxe, and nothing approaching nearer to the navvy's 

 barrow than a rude wicker basket to be carried on the shoulders. 

 A glorious sight it must have been to watch these swarms of fiei y 

 men at work, their wild hair streaming in the wind, with all the 

 symmetry of their sinewy limbs exposed to view. 



It is far from improbable that in the year 1685, this very earth- 

 work sheltered the Duke of Monmouth in his flight from Sedgmoor. 

 He and his two companions, as is well known, abandoned their 

 tired out horses in the neighbouring Cranbourne Chase : there it 

 was that the Duke changed his dangerously conspicuous clothes 

 for those of a labouring man ; and as he must have crossed the open 

 downs to reach the place where he was taken (a field in the parish 

 of Horton), he probably chose the cover afibrded by this dyke to 

 shield him from the view of those who were in search of him, and 

 who would narrowly watch the open down. A quarter of a mile 

 or less from the point at which the dyke intersects the Blandford 

 turnpike road, stands Woodyates Inn, in former times a well-known 

 posting house. Though it still may possess a pair of posters, it is 

 better known and frequented as being the training establishment 

 of Mr. William Day. At this inn King George III. always 

 changed horses when on his way to Weymouth, and the room that 

 was built for his use on these occasions, together with its outside 

 flight of steps, is still remaining. The downs in this neighbour- 

 hood afford likewise many traces of the occupation of England by 

 the Romans. The Roman Road from Bradbury Rings in Dorset- 

 shire, passes by this inn on its way to old Sarum. Straight as a 

 bird can fly, it crosses hill and dale, and many portions of it remain 

 as when first made, except that roadway and embankment alike 

 are covered with turf. From the end of the enclosed land, beyond 

 Woodyates Inn, towards Blandford, over the hill into the village of 

 Gussage St. Michael, it remains untouched, except in some few 

 places where gaps have been cut to allow waggons and carts to 

 cross it. In form it resembles a narrow railway embankment, but 



