8 



Villa Field, and a Roman Villa may also have existed there, 

 " Since the publication of Sir R. Atkins's History (says 

 Rudder), other antiquities hare been found in a field called 

 Beach, in the hundred of Wick, by people at plough, 

 in the year 1743, who turned up with the soil a quantity 

 of brick, very hard and ponderous, and much superior 

 in fineness to what we make. Mr Haynes, the proprie- 

 tor of the ground, caused the surface to be opened, and 

 presently found that these were parts of a brick pillar. 

 There were three foundations of such pillars standing in 

 aline, each 21 inches square; the intervals were 13 inches. 

 The three pillars stood against the middle of an abutment 

 in the foundation of rough stonework, measuiing 5 J feet 

 in front, which being carried on in the same direction 

 with the pillars about 22 inches, then spread itself outwards 

 on each side in a circular sweep." 



It seems plain from this description that they had come 

 upon the hypocaust, the floor of which had been torn up, 

 and that it had, like many other Roman rooms, a circular 

 apse as a termination. The account goes on to state that, 

 " between the pillars, in beds of mortar, were parts of several 

 urns of fine red pottery, but of different shapes and 

 dimensions, some pieces of wood burnt to a coal, a crooked 

 sacrificing knife, about 6 inches long, and the jaw bone of a 

 sheep or a goat. And some time afterwards the capital of a 

 pillar of freestone, about 2 foot square in the cornice, was 

 turned up by the plough in the same field. From these 

 remains, and from a gi-eat number of Roman coins found 

 there, which are in Mr. Haynes's possession, there can be no 

 doubt of this having been a Roman work." Mr. EUacombe, 

 the rector of Clyst St. George, writes me word through his son, 

 that he has always considered Mr. Haynes's V^illa, hei'e 

 described, to be the one near the Cromlech, viz , that which 

 this Club has uncovered. 



