200 THE EXETER ROAD 



place, and not tlie great stones merely, impresses by 

 its sadness and utter detachment from the living- 

 world, its loves and hates and interests. The birds 

 forget to sino- in 'this loneliness, which is awful in 

 winter and not less awful in the emptiness visible 

 under the blue sky and blazing sun of summer. Just 

 the situation in which Stonehenge is placed, you 

 understand, not Stonehenge itself, gives these feelings. 

 ' Do not we gaze with awe upon these massive 

 stones ? ' asks the high-falutin guide-book compiler. 

 No, indeed we don't. It is a pity, but it can't be 

 done, and the average description of Stonehenge 

 which sets forth the grandeur and stupendous size 

 of these stones, is pumped-up fudge and flapdoodle 

 of the damnablest kind, which takes in no one. It 

 is not merely the Philistine who thinks thus, but 

 even the would-be marvel! ers, and those of light and 

 leading are disquieted by secret thoughts that, had 

 we a mind to it, and if there was money in it, we could 

 build a better and a bigger Stonehenge l)y a long way. 

 The earliest account of this mystic monument is 

 found in the writings of Nennius, wdio lived in the 

 ninth century. The hrst-comer is entitled to respect, 

 and when Nennius tells us that Stonehenge was 

 erected by the surviving Britons, in memory of four 

 hundred and sixty British nobles, murdered here at a 

 conference to which the Saxon chieftain, Hengist, had 

 invited King Vortigern and his Court, we are bound 

 to pay some attention to the statement, although to 

 place implicit reliance upon it would be rash, con- 

 sidering the fact that Nennius wrote four hundred 

 years after the event. 



