JOURNAL 



OF 



A NATURALIST. 



THE village in which I reside is situated upon a very 

 ancient road, connecting the city of Bristol with that 

 of Gloucester, and thus with all the great towns in the 

 North of England. This road runs for the chief part 

 upon a high limestone ridge, from which we obtain a 

 very beautiful and extensive prospect : the broad estuary 

 of the river Severn, the mountains of Glamorgan, Mon- 

 mouth, and Brecon, with their peaceful vales, and 

 cheerful-looking white cottages, form the distant view : 

 beneath it lies a vast extent of arable and pasture land, 

 gained originally by the power of man from this great 

 river, and preserved now from her incursions by a con- 

 siderable annual expenditure, testifying his industry 

 and perseverance, and exhibiting his reward. The Aust 

 ferry, supposed to be the " trajectus," or place where 

 the Romans were accustomed to pass the Severn, is 

 visible, with several stations of that people and the an- 

 cient British, being a part of that great chain of forts 

 originally maintained to restrain the plundering inroads 

 of the restless inhabitants of the other bank of the 

 river: Thornbury, with its fine cathedral-like church 

 and castle, the opposite red cliffs of the Severn, and the 

 stream itself, are fine and interesting features. 



An encampment of some people, probably Romans, 

 occupies a rather elevated part of the parish, consisting 

 of perhaps three acres of ground, surrounded by a high 

 agger, with no ditch, or a very imperfect one, and prob- 

 ably was never designed for protracted resistance : it 

 appears to form one of the above-mentioned series of 

 forts erected by Ostorius, commencing at Weston, in 

 Somersetshire, and terminating at Bredon in the county 



