86 LIFE OF SIR JOHN LUBBOCK 



CH. 



They visited Hallstatt, where they made some 

 excavations, and as the Austrian Government 

 proposed to drop their investigations, he and 

 Sir John Evans arranged with M. Ramsauer, the 

 late Director of the mines, that he should go on 

 with the work on their joint account. This was 

 the origin of the Hallstatt antiquities now at 

 High Elms. The arrangement went on for several 

 years, when the Austrian Government themselves 

 again took the work in hand. 



From Vienna Sir John Evans returned to 

 London. Sir John and Lady Lubbock went on 

 to Italy, visiting Florence, Perugia, and Rome, 

 where they saw the Pope bless the people at 

 Easter ; and from Rome they went on to Naples, 

 where he received the news of the great financial 

 panic in London, and immediately returned. 

 He found all quiet again, though there were 

 several more failures. 



About the same time he engaged in a friendly 

 discussion with Mr. James Ferguson as to the 

 age of Avebury and Stonehenge, respectively. 

 Mr. Ferguson considered Avebury to be post- 

 Roman, and Stonehenge to be British as late as 

 a.d. 467. Sir John regarded Stonehenge as belong- 

 ing to the Bronze Age, and Avebury to be the 

 earlier of the two. As regards Avebury Mr. 

 Ferguson based his opinion on the idea that 

 Silbury Hill rested on, and was therefore later 

 than, the Roman Road from Bath to Marlborough. 

 Sir John Lubbock, on the contrary, maintained 

 that after steering straight for Silbury Hill the 

 road ran round it, so that the hill must be older 

 than the road. 



