i9i4' I 9 I 5-] Hadrians Wall. 149 



in the agricultural districts through which it runs, just as we 

 found that it had disappeared in the scenes of industrial 

 activity around Newcastle, and let us take a short glance at 

 that Eoman city of Corstorpitum which I mentioned earlier. 



Mr Kipling, in ' Puck of Pook's Hill,' talks about the line 

 of the wall being one vast town, eighty miles long, stretched 

 across the country, lying like a snake in the sun, wicked as a 

 snake. That is probably an exaggeration. There were un- 

 doubtedly long stretches of rough and lonely moorland along 

 the wall between the stations, just as at the present day, but 

 there were also towns enough, and if Corstorpitum was not 

 actually on the wall, it was near enough to be in close touch 

 with it, lying three miles to the south, on the banks of the 

 Tyne, and on the outskirts of the little modern town of Cor- 

 bridge. Coins, bits of pottery, fragments of statues, and 

 inscribed stones have been unearthed here. 



Eemains of buildings, including granaries, have been ex- 

 cavated. The Komans were not vegetarians. One of the 

 commonest things one sees about the excavations are the 

 bones of the animals they used for food ; but wherever you 

 go, in station or civil town, you are sure to see some granaries, 

 and they are all built upon the same plan, — massive rectan- 

 gular buildings with a succession of heavy buttresses lending 

 additional strength. The floor was laid, not upon the ground 

 but upon dwarf walls, running longitudinally or transversely 

 or upon pillars, like the hypocausts in the houses. This 

 raised it from the ground and made it damp-proof, and be- 

 tween each pair of buttresses there was a long narrow slit for 

 the passage of air for ventilation purposes. 



The Forum of the town has been excavated. A cistern or 

 trough, part of a public fountain, was found, showing in a 

 very marked manner the same semicircular scoopings observed 

 in the trough at Borcovicus. Whether this is due to the 

 sharpening of knives and weapons, or to the rubbing of iron 

 pails dipped into the trough for water as they were pulled over 

 the edge, is a disputed point. In any case, it is evidence of 

 long and hard usage. You can see the remains of the base 

 of the fountain. It is constructed in the usual substantial 

 manner, though the fact that there are no deep foundations 

 proves that the superstructure was not of a heavy nature. 



