240 Recent Wiltshire Books, Pamphlets, and Articles. 



Court — Wilton House — South Wraxall (from a print)— Longleat — The 

 Hall, Bradford-on-Avon — Avebury (bird's-eye view of the circles from a 

 print — and Stonelienge. Each of these is accompanied by an article of 

 about ten pages, chiefly dealing with the historical associations of the 

 places illustrated — the article on Bowood having no illustration. These 

 articles are for the most part reprints, with a few additional notes here and 

 there, of the small pamphlets issued by Mr. Michael, of Westbury, from 

 time to time years ago. 



The Exeter Road, The Story of the West of England 

 Highway, by Charles G-. Harper, illustrated by the 



author and from old-time prints and pictures. London : Chapman & 

 Hall, Limited. 1899. 8vo., pp. xvii., 318, with 69 full-page illustrations 

 and cuts in the text. 



This well-printed and well-illustrated book, as the preface warns us, 

 concerns itself more with 18th and early 19th century gossip and 

 anecdotes of the road, than with the matters which appeal more especially 

 to the antiquary, the architect, or the archaeologist. The road enters 

 Wiltshire near Winterslow Hut, and leaves it near Woodyates Inn, and 

 to this portion of the journey pages 156 — 242 are devoted. Winterslow 

 Hut itself is famous as the scene of the attack on one of the horses of 

 the Exeter Mail by the escaped lioness Oct. 20th, 1816 — and also as the 

 house to which William Ha?,lit retired in 1819, and where he wrote the 

 "Winterslow Essays" and "Napoleon." The lioness scene, after a 

 picture by James.Pollard, forms the frontispiece of the book, and there is 

 also a full page drawing of the house as it now exists. Old Sarum and 

 Salisbury are visited; of the former there is a full-page view " after 

 Constable," as well as a curious full-page " View of Salisbury Spire from 

 the Eamparts"; of the latter, a nice full-page, " Salisbury Cathedral, 

 after Constable," and a cut of St. Ann's Gate. The author has a partiality 

 for executions — the Marian Martyrs ; Loi-d Stourton, murderer of the 

 Hartgills ; George Carpenter and George Ruddock, murderers, who 

 suffered in 1813 on Warminster Down ; Eobert Turner Watkins, hung 

 in 1819 for a murder near Purton ; Joshua Shemp, a gipsy, hung by 

 mistake in 1801, and buried in Odstock Churchyard ; Coote, leader of 

 the machine rioters in 1830 ; and many others are mentioned in order 

 to support the sufficiently extraordinary statement that " this fair city 

 has been almost as much of a Golgotha as the settlements of savage 

 African Kinglets are wont to be." 



Amesbury and Stonehenge, though off the road, are described— three 

 full-page plates being given to the latter : "Stonehenge after Turner," 

 "Sunrise at Stonehenge," and " Ancient and Modern : Motor Cars at 

 Stonehenge, Easter, 1899." There is also a plate of "The Great Snowstorm 

 of 1836 : The Exeter ' Telegraph,' assisted by post horses, driving through 

 the Snowdrifts at Amesbury (after James Pollard)." The next 16 pages 

 are devoted to the Highwaymen of the Plain — WiUiam Davis— James 

 Whitney— Biss— Thomas Boulter, Sen.— Isaac Blagden— and Thomas 

 Boulter, Jun,, of Poulshot (the greatest hero of them all)— Mary Sandall, 



