102 WAYFARING NOTIONS 



bell-ornamented distance-markers. Simply, they 

 have buried themselves in the earth by their 

 own weight. I found one the other day nearly 

 sunk, little more than the numerals 48 at the 

 top of the casting remained above ground — that 

 and just one bell. An almost if not quite, 

 identical device occurs in the graveyards near 

 about. Mr F. Chatterton, writing from Sussex 

 to kindly enlighten me, ought to know when he 

 says that of the bells of which I spoke, with a 

 true-lover's knot sort of scroll bow at the top 

 symbolise Bow Bells — a suggestion another good 

 friend made previously. Here is the letter : — 



" Apparently you did not notice the very evident 

 bow above the bells. The assumption that because 

 there are bells on some of the tombstones they must 

 have the same explanation as those on the milestones, 

 is entirely your own. People living in the district have 

 always been aware that on the milestones it signified 

 miles so-and-so from Bow Bells. Whether from Bow 

 Church or the parish, is not clear ; probably from Bow 

 Church." 



But even now I am not certain that we have the 

 right solution of a puzzle I, at one time and 

 another, took a goodish deal of trouble to unravel. 

 When my informant says that people living in 

 the district have always been aware that the 

 numerals indicate distance in miles from Bow 

 Bells, the church, or parish, he quotes authorities 

 never available in my little investigations. Not 

 once but many times have I consulted people 

 living in the district — Brighton, through Lewes 

 to East Grinstead by two roads, makes my district 

 for purposes of this argument — also asked Sussex 

 archaeological celebrities, and gone empty away. 



