By the Rev. W. Q. Plenderleath, 261 
which the path runs, seeing a stile without any visible road on either 
side of it, took it away, and made good the bank and hedge where 
it had been. The next time I chanced to be going into Calne that 
way I found myself confronted with an unexpected obstacle. I 
however got over the hedge, and wrote to the agent. In a week’s 
time I had a reply to say that my correspondent had had no idea 
that any right of way existed there, but that_on enquiry he had 
found such to be the case, and that he would send a new stile to be 
put in the place of the old one. Two months elapsed: I had 
passed several times that way, and had been obliged each time to 
get over the new-made hedge, so I again wrote to the agent. He 
courteously replied that he had sent the stile a week after writing 
to me before, and had been under the impression that it had been 
duly erected, but that he found on enquiry that it had been placed 
on another path some hundred yards or so to the right. He would, 
however, send another stile. Again an interval of six weeks: still 
no alteration. Again I wrote to the agent, and was told in reply 
that he had duly sent a second stile, but that this had been placed 
on a path some hundred yards or so to the left! He would, how- 
ever, cause a third stile to be made and would see it fitted himself. 
This he did, and the way has been open ever since. It is not, as I 
said, a whit shorter than the present high road, but it is a pleasant 
change in summer from the dust and hardness of that way, and it 
was, the old people tell me, a good deal used in the days of their 
youth. I was coming out this way a few years ago when I passed 
within a couple of yards of a big dog-fox who was lying curled up 
in the long grass. He got up and trotted away with the most 
perfect unconcern, turning before he jumped through the hedge to 
look back at the person who had taken leave thus to disturb him 
out of the hunting season. 
Cherhill must have been a place of considerably more importance 
in the coaching days than it is now. It is stated to have been 
traversed by as many as thirty coaches daily, either going to or 
coming from London, besides vans, waggons, post-chaises, &e. 
And for the accommodation of wayfarers by all these conveyances 
there were four wayside inns in the parish. One, at the top of the 
