Transactions. 5 



Donations. — Transactions of the Edinburgh Geological Society 

 and of the Epping Forest Field Club. 



Mr James Lennox submitted the audited balance-sheet for 

 the -preceding Session, which was unanimously adopted, and the 

 Treasurer was thanked for his honorary services. 



Communications. 



I. A Note on the Roman Camp at Springfield Hill, Dunscore. By 

 J. Callander, M.D. 

 The height on Springfield Hill Farm, Dunscore, on which the 

 Roman Camp is situated, is nearly oblong in shape. Its longer 

 diameter, roughly speaking, runs nearly from east to west. On 

 its north, west, and south sides it is separated from surrounding 

 heights by wide and deep hollows. On its east side it is joined by 

 a narrow sloping neck of land to the cultivated fields which trend 

 away to the level holms f;ir below. The surface of its summit is 

 level, and measures about five thousand square yards. It is 

 distant about two hundred yards from the public road leading over 

 the hill from Dunscore Milage to Dunscore Old Churchyard, and 

 about the same distance from Springfield Hill farm house. It was 

 for a cantonment in time of peace, and as a post of observation, 

 we believe, that the Camp on Springfield Hill was constructed 

 about the year A.D. 82. It marks not a position taken up by an 

 army on active service in the field, but a permanent station held 

 by a small force in time of peace. Several facts may be mentioned 

 which appear to give support to this theory. The Camp is situ- 

 ated near to the line of a Roman road, which ran from the south- 

 east in the direction of the north-west, some vestiges of which 

 were discovered and removed a few years ago. It is far too small 

 to have afforded accommodation to any considerable force. If a 

 Roman army of twenty thousand men required an area of four 

 hundred and ninety thousand square yards on which to construct 

 its camp, as we know it did, the Springfield Hill Camp, with its 

 available area of five thousand square yards, could only have 

 accommodated a detachment of from two hundred to two hundred 

 and twenty men. Water must have been brought from some 

 distance to Springfield Hill. A small force in the field would 

 never have entrenched itself in a position where an active and 

 determined foe could easily have cut it off" from its water supply. 

 The Camp is not fortified in the manner in which a Roman army 



