GLOUCESTERSHIRE. 



The northern part of Gloucestershire, where it borders upon 

 Oxfordshire, Worcestershire, and Warwickshire, and which is 

 traversed by part of the oolitic range of the Cotswold Hills, has 

 been left almost entirely unexplored with respect to the evidence it 

 affords of early occupation, and especially as regards places of 

 sepulture. Numerous remains however, both of those things 

 which have relation to the living and of the mounds which mark 

 the sites where the dead have been deposited, still exist, though 

 many of the barrows have disappeared, entirely or in part, through 

 the various processes of agriculture. No signs of primitive occupa- 

 tion are perhaps more striking than the almost imperishable articles 

 of flint and other stone, which in so many cases have alone been 

 left to tell us that, in times before the record of written evidence 

 existed, and when even the more uncertain testimony of tradition 

 had died away, man had lived upon the earth. Such implements 

 are found scattered widely and in abundance throughout almost 

 every part of the district in question, and we owe it to the energy 

 and intelligence of the Rev. David Royce, Vicar of Nether Swell, 

 that numerous examples of them have been sought out and pre- 

 served. His collection comprises a very large and varied assort- 

 ment of flint arrow-points, knives, scrapers, and other articles 

 of uncertain use, brought together from his own and neighbouring 

 parishes. In connection with this there is a circumstance which 

 requires to be noticed, and which it is very difficult to account for. 

 Axes, adzes, and others of the larger implements are almost en- 

 tirely wanting. Mr. Royce has had collected for him for some 

 years past, by the labourers engaged in agricultural operations, 

 every article which attracted their attention as being different from 



