68 



ing also that the operation should be made conducive to the 

 improvement as well as the pleasm-e of the villagers ; and 

 thus this visit of the Club will not be without a beneficial 

 effect. 



The Second Excursion, which had been fixed for May 21st 

 to Wroxeter, was, owing to the Vice-Presidents suggestion, 

 at a Special Meeting called for that purpose, unanimously 

 postponed and a joint Excursion with the Members of the 

 Cotteswold Club on 22nd, to Chedworth, in the neighbom-hood 

 of Cirencester, agreed upon. On the arrival by train at the 

 latter town, three breaks full of learned — or at any rate 

 inquiring — brethren, with a supplementary one-horse carriage, 

 started from the Kings Head for " Foss Bridge," a pleasant 

 hostelry in a pretty combe about two miles distant from the 

 object of the day's Excursion. Nothing to call for any remark 

 occmTed on the road. One halt was made at a wayside 

 quarry, where hammers and eyes were busily at work to 

 ascertain the character of the beds exposed. " Great Oolite 

 with a capping of Forest Marble " was the dictum of the 

 chief The carriages were once more filled, and proceeded 

 along the ancient Foss Road, which once extended from Devon- 

 shire to Lincolnshii-e, over a rolling country of hill and combe. 

 The cutting north-east wind that blew across the elevated 

 table-land suggested anything but the genial month of May, 

 and the party were not sorry to find themselves at last beneath 

 the friendly shelter of the Chedworth woods — last haunt in 

 these parts of the badger and the raven — the delight also in the 

 present day of the natm-ahst, for here grow many rare plants, 

 and over their 1,200 acres roams freely the Helix pomatia, fat 

 and fleshy as ever, though the noble Roman whose table it 

 graced has left only his ruins behind him. These remains, 

 however, are such as rarely greet the eye of the antiquary in 

 England. Lately, in one of the most pictm-esque of spots, 

 has been uncovered, through the liberality of Lord Eldon, 



