MISCELLANEA. 369 



peat-bogs at great elevations that have been examined. The 

 general appearance of the country would be much the same as 

 sung by the poet in other lands. 



"Fkiminibus salices, crassisqiie paludibus alni 



Nascuntur, steriles saxosis montibus orni." 



Barren birks spread themselves over the rocky fells, allers co- 

 vered the dense swamps, and sallows fringed the streams, with 

 here and there in suitable places groves of gnarled oak and plots 

 of lofty Scotch Fir. Along the glades of the dense swamps 

 roamed the fierce Urus and the Wild -Boar, in the quietudes 

 of the more lofty forest the Elk and the Red-Deer with Roe on 

 the hill-sides, and here and there packs of bloodthirsty wolves. 

 Excepting the last both plants and animals have left their re- 

 mains in deposits of peat indubitable witness of their former 

 presence in these counties. 



And how different is the appearance of these British towns 

 now from those described centuries ago by Caesar. " Oppida au- 

 tem Britanni vocant, cum silvas impeditas, vallo atque fossa 

 munierunt, quo incursionis hostium vitandae causa convenire 

 consuerint." From this one must conclude that all these old 

 camps in Northumberland, bare and exposed as they are at the 

 present day, were concealed and protected by a dense vegetation, 

 as well as by walls of earth and rubble, each family required, 

 the race being very quarrelsome, to be protected against its 

 neighbours, tribe against tribe as strictly as against the Roman 

 or any other foe. All the rocks among these dense woods would 

 then be covered over with a rich garment of lichens and other 

 plants, no bare stones being left uncovered, and in such a state 

 no doubt had these concentric cii'cles being buried long before 

 Celt or Neolith, or Palaiolith, or any other form of man, terra 

 edita or not, had sprung up to trouble the surface of the country 

 with ruthless wars. 



And with regard to the meaning of these circles, if the theory 

 proposed in this paper bo correct, tliese markings, instead of 

 being symbolical of a future, may be only direct evidence of a 

 past life of plants whicli flourished and faded, whicli groA\' upon 

 tlie first bare upheaved 8urfac(^s of the rock-head when it was 



