THE HAMPSHIRE ANTIQUARY & NATURALIST. 



CURIOUS EPITAPHS. 

 The following are in Carisbrooke churchyard. 

 Sacred to the memory of five children of William and 

 Ann Cheverton, who died in their infancy. 



There was a heavenly friend who knew 

 What perils would your path bestrew, 

 And in his arms he sheltered you, 

 Sweet babes. 



MOSES MORRIS, 

 Died May 6th, 1841. 



This humble stone shall bear one humble line, 

 Here lies a sinner saved by grace divine. 



J. DORE. 



THE HAMPSHIRE INDEPENDENT, June 7, 1890. 



WEATHER IN MAY. 



This has been a beautiful month, perhaps such a 

 one as is scarcely remembered. Sixteen days we 

 entered " fine sunshine," that is sunshine all day ; 

 added to this the rains have been copious, so that 

 everything abounds with the greatest luxuriance. 

 The total rainfall has been somewhat over the 

 average, being 2 '24, and the average of the previous 

 ten years is 2-09 inches. Since January i we have 

 had io'8i, and the average of the same time is 11*31 

 inches. The barometer has been under the average, 

 registering 30 inches and above on only nine days. 

 The fluctuations have been small, the highest being 

 30-30 and the lowest 29-45 inches. The latter part of 

 the month showed a high rate of temperature by day. 

 The highest was 76 deg. on the 25th, and it was 70 

 deg. and upwards on six days during the month. 

 On the other hand, the nights have been frequently 

 cold. The thermometer recorded 34 deg. on the 

 night of the 3ist, three feet above the ground, which 

 was probably a frost on the grass ; it was also 36 

 deg. on two nights, and 37 and 38 deg, on one night 

 each during the month. 



Fordingbridge. T. WESTLAKE. 



SILCHESTER. 



The arrangements for the projected systematic ex- 

 cavations at Silchester, the English Pompeii, are 

 making steady progress. The Society of Antiquaries, 

 without any asking, has already received 200 to- 

 wards the undertaking, and this in addition to the 

 generous undertaking of Dr. Freshfield, the treasurer, 

 to provide the funds for the excavation of an entire 

 irtsula, or square, It has already been ascertained 

 that the city of Calleva (Silchester) was divided into 

 squares by streets intersecting each other at right 

 angles, and this fact renders the conduct of excava- 

 tions more easy. Everything tends to point out that 

 a most promising return may be expected from these 

 \vorks. The coins, for instance, that have been 

 already found on the site are exceedingly interesting, 

 not only in number, but in chronological range. They 

 commence with the reign of Caligula, A.D. 37, and 



end only with the Roman evacuation of Britain in the 

 reign of Arcadius, about A.D. 410 to A.D. 415, pointing 

 to a continuous occupation of Calleva during the 

 whole of this period. 



" The result of excavations at Silchester," say 

 Messrs. Fox and Hope, to whom the whole credit of 

 the project belongs, " if those excavations are carried 

 on steadily and thoroughly, will be to reveal to the 

 world the whole life and history, as seen in its re- 

 mains, of a Romano-British city, a city which we 

 already know had a long-continued existence. Our 

 country has many Roman sites still awaiting the pick 

 and spade, none more promising than Silchester, and 

 it is a reproach to English archaeology that so little 

 has as yet been done to make them yield the harvest 

 of knowledge which they would undoubtedly afford. 

 That the site of Silchester ought to be completely and 

 systematically excavated is a point upon which 

 English antiquaries have for some time been agreed ; 

 but either from unwillingness to face so large an 

 undertaking, or the question of expense, or some 

 such cause, no definite plan has yet been brought 

 forward. The complete excavation of a site of a 

 hundred acres is of course a stupendous work, and the 

 large size of the area as seen from the walls is enough 

 to dishearten a good many people. If, however, we 

 give way to such feelings, Silchester will never be 

 excavated at all, and even if it will take more than 

 one man's lifetime to do it thoroughly, that is no 

 reason why the work begun by Mr. Joyce should not 

 be systematically resumed and carried on unflinch- 

 ingly year after year.'' The Antiquary. 



SMALL CHURCHES. 



The claim for the apparently enviable distinction of being 

 the very smallest parish church in the kingdom has been 

 hotly disputed from time to time, but since it was shown 

 that the small Sussex church of Lullington, alleged to be 

 only 16 feet square, was after all but the chancel of a much 

 older building (though there were only 16 parishioners, or 

 just one square foot per head), St. Lawrence, in the Isle of 

 Wight, has been acknowledged to deserve the pre-eminence 

 in this strange category. Of all the small churches this 

 must indeed be the smallest, for its precise dimensions 

 until recently were 20 feet long, 12 feet broad, and 6 feet 

 high to the eaves dimensions which would leave much to 

 be desired even in the dining-room of a private household. 

 At Pilham, in Lincolnshire, a parish church was built for a 

 congregation of 58, and the builders were so 

 economical of space that thev dispensed with a 

 chancel, putting the Communion table in an 

 apse of 6| feet deep. Without this recess the 

 church would not be 27 feet long. In Somersetshire and 

 Dorsetshire, placed where in olden times they would serve 

 the needs ot the scanty scattered populations upon the 

 sheep grazing downs, there may still be found an 

 occasional church of wondrously small dimensions, whose 

 fame even for this type of lowliness has never been noised 

 abroad. As these little houses of prayer were in their 

 prime in the three-decker days, so to speak, when the 

 parson and the clerk were inseparable, and when high 

 enclosed pews wasted what little space there was for use, 



