PßOCEEDINGS 



OF THE 



SOMEßSETSHIRE ARCHiEOLOGICAL AND 

 NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, 



1859, PART II. 



PAPERS, ETC. 



BY THE KEA^ THOMAS HUGO, M.A., F.S.A., F.K.S.L., ETC., 

 HON. MEMBER. 



JUST outslde the eastern boundary of the town of 

 Taunton, Avithln sight of its towers and sound of its 

 melodious bells, a number of green aud flowery fields edge 

 the winding banks of a river, than whlch not one in Eng- 

 land presents more captivating scenes of peaceful retirement 

 and rural beauty. The meadow next adjacent to the 

 gardens, which belong to houses vvhose fronts are in the 

 neighbouring street, yet exhibits featurcs indicative of an 

 use widely contrasting with that to which it is at present 

 applied. Numerous inequallties of surface, although cover- 

 ed with a rieh and luxuriant sward, unmistakeably suggest, 

 even by their very regularity, the conclusion that the place 

 has witnessed a far other and busier kind of life, whatever 

 and whcnever that was, than the existence of dreamy silcnce 

 and uninterrupted repose to which it has been at length con- 

 öigncd. These grassy mounds, if they could rcvcal their 



VOL. IX., 1859, PAKT II. A 



