XXVI. 



THE DEVIL'S PUNCHBOWL. 



ON Sunday the boys came home for their 

 half-term holiday, so we strolled in the 

 morning into the Devil's Punchbowl. That 

 is the name of the basin-shaped valley that 

 lies behind the house a deep circular glen, 

 scooped out in a softer portion of the sand- 

 stone mass that forms the moor by rain and 

 denudation. Thor owned it, I doubt not, 

 long before it was claimed by its present 

 possessor, for the parish is Thursley ; and 

 some Celtic god, whose name is only known 

 to Professor Rhys, may have used it as his 

 drinking -cup long before the Norseman 

 brought his Thor, or the Saxon his Thunor, 

 into the Surrey uplands. But the devil is 

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