CASTLE NEROCHE 41 
altogether forming a series of works amply sufhicient for 
the protection of the beacon, the two sides of the narrow 
slope being too steep to require any regular entrenchments, 
though they were perhaps strengthened by platforms for 
slingers, some of which, I think, I have succeeded in 
tracing. We now find ourselves on the top of the beacon: 
and from this point, but for the plantation, we should 
obtain a comprehensive view of the whole entrenchment, 
which lies immediately below us, on the south of a deep 
trench, dividing the beacon itself from the rest of the 
hill. This trench may have been in part natural, but it 
has been so much increased by artificial escarpment, as to 
render it an eflicient defence either to the beacon or to the 
main fortification, in case either of them was attacked by 
a hostile force. Round the summit of the beacon itself, 
traces remain of a massive wall of strongly cemented 
masonry ; but this has been pronounced by a highly com- 
petent authority to be of Roman construction, and is 
consequently of later date than the earthworks I have 
described; as this, however, probably replaced the stockade 
of wooden beams, which it is believed usually crowned the 
British mounds, the beacon must have always presented 
obstacles well nigh insurmountable to any attack not 
conducted with the science peculiar to the warfare of 
eivilized nations.. From this point, the slopes of the hill 
towards the north-east, on the one side, and on the south- 
west on the other, are so steep as not to require any artifi- 
cial defences; and these accordinzly, with the exception 
perhaps of platforms for slingers, were dispensed with, 
except in that part of the camp which constitutes that 
remarkable feature of British fortifieation, to which I have 
alluded as being almost analogous to the keep of a medie- 
val castle. This, in the present instance, is situated imme- 
1854, PART II. F 
