IX 



Bindon Hill 233 



an answer, or one that is not wildest guesswork? 

 Did some invading chieftain steer his black ships 

 into the cove, and possess himself of Bindon, as a 

 first step to the conquest of the inland country ? Or 

 was this the arx, the irrokieOpov, of the people of 

 the district round about, to which they could fly 

 for refuge at the approach of an enemy from the 

 north ? There is a sense of melancholy in these blind 

 attempts to pierce the utterly forgotten past ; all the 

 human endeavour, endurance, and courage that may 

 have spent itself on Bindon has vanished for ever 

 out of sight, leaving only these dumb earthworks to 

 tempt the local antiquary into fanciful conjecture. 



But these are mere accidents of Bindon ; slight 

 human scratchings on his massive form. Let us 

 climb up on his back, and see what he himself really 

 is, how he clothes himself, and what creatures de- 

 light to live on him and about him. 



The monster's shaggy hide is, perhaps, the first of 

 his real attributes that seizes on the eye. Each steep 

 flank is clothed with this hide ; it is now, in autumn 

 following a dry summer, brown and withered, but not 

 mangy-looking like that which some of his neighbours 

 wear. In the summer it is a soft golden-green, which 

 the sun looks into lovingly and lights up, for the ends 

 and edges of the longer blades are always brown, 

 which passes into a golden glow as the sun comes 

 from behind a cloud. On the steep slopes it hangs 



