59 
We areontheextreme north-eastern verge of the County of Somerset 
and have a very fine and extensive view—including Monmouth- 
shire—to the west, and Dorsetshire and even the Hampshire hills to 
the south, and the Marlborough Downs to the east and south-east 
The Tower on the edge of the Down, built by the late Mr. Wade 
Browne, replaced a semaphore which had been erected by the 
Government Surveyors in the time of the Welsh riots. 
The sheep down along the top of the Bathford Hill is an 
ancient ridgeway—which communicated with the adjacent Manors’ 
in Wilts and Gloucester for a considerable distance—no bounds 
except perhaps Boundary stones formerly marking the division of 
the parishes. On these links (as they are called elsewhere) the 
country people used to play a game called, ‘‘ Stow,” or “Stole ball,” 
now known to the aristocracy as the noble game of Golfe. I 
remember observing some holes like large marble holes on the 
down a great many years ago, and being told by an old inhabitant 
that they were used in a game played in these parts, and as he 
believed not in many other places in England. 
While on this commanding height it may be interesting to try 
and picture to ourselves what was the condition of the country, 
not very long before the Charter from which we have quoted was 
drawn up. 
At the time of the Saxon invasion, and even long after the time 
of Alfred, this whole country was a vast Forest, the Downs 
probably occupied as sheep pastures, and here and there as natural 
fortresses, but the sides of the hills and the valleys to a great 
extent covered with wood, Dr. Guest places the crest of Bathford 
Hill, which rises so steeply and grandly above the valley, as the 
Headland which on this side of England, after the Battle of 
Dyrham, was the frontier of tbe British Kingdom of Damnonia, 
extending over Somerset and part of Hampshire, to Devon and 
Cornwall. There are some indications here of encampments, and 
the Wansdyke undoubtedly culminated in and crossed the Farleigh 
Down a short distance beyond Wade Browne’s Tower. The 
