160 JRecent Wiltshire Books, Pamphlets, Articles, &c. 



Mallliesbury Abbey. The 1200th anniversary of the death of St. 

 Aldhelm was celebrated at Malmesbury on May 25th, 1909. The Bishop 

 of Bristol's address on St. Aldhelm is printed in the Wiltshire Times, 

 May 29th, with cuts of the Abbey (S. side), S. Porch, Abbot's Pew or 

 Watching Chamber, N. Arch, and Market Cross, and in Devizes Gazette, 

 May 27th, 1909. An abstract of a lecture on the architectural history of 

 the Abbey delivered on this occasion by Mr. H. Brakspear, F.S.A., is 

 also printed in Devizes Gazette. 



Fontllill A good article in Wiltshire Times, May 15th, 1909, No. xxi. 

 of " Picturesque Wiltshire." 



Bath StOne Quarrying", An article in The Estate Magazine, 

 quoted in Wiltshire Times, October 24th, 1908, gives an interesting 

 account of the present method of quarrying. 



" In former times Bath Stone was worked from surface quarries, but 

 when the Box tunnel was in course of construction, it was found that the 

 bastard freestone and scallet above the Bath Stone beds were quite strong 

 enough to support the superincumbent rock and earth, with the result 

 that nowadays the whole of the Bath stone quarries are worked as under- 

 ground quarries. The quarry (near Corsham) leased by Messrs. Lucas 

 & Kinnear covers an area of thirty acres. . . . Here the seam of 

 Bath stone is seventy-three feet below the surface. . . . The quarries 

 are large, well ventilated caverns, with endless passageways and great 

 halls hewn out of the living rock. The Bath Stone seam totals about 

 thirty feet in depth, consisting of a top bed of scallet, a soft stone very 

 much resembling Caen stone, and capable of taking highly finished 

 designs but suitable only for pulpit and similar indoor work, being too 

 soft to stand the weather. This accounts for about seven feet of the 

 depth, but as the demand for this is not very great, only small quantities 

 are hewn. Below this is sixteen feet of good Bath stone obtainable in 

 blocks of all shapes and sizes, from one ton to ten tons in weight, and 

 from a cube foot to eleven or twelve feet in length and corresponding 

 thickness. Below this again lies a bed of seven feet of weather stone. 

 . Because of this softness and the liability of the stone to damage 

 by frost (.when just quarried), none is brought to the surface between the 

 months of October and April, the entire quantity quarried and sawn 

 during that period being stacked underground until it may be safely 

 brought to the surface to harden and mature. To properly stack it huge 

 cranes are used, being fixed in the wider parts of the roadways with pins 

 in ceilin CT and roof. . . . The stone is got for the quarry owners by 

 parties of men under gangers. These gangers undertake, at a contract 

 price, to produce a certain quantity of stone. . . . Wages average 

 about 25*. per week. . . . The bulk of the stone is sold at an average 

 price of Is. per cubic foot to builders within one hundred and fifty miles 

 of the quarries, freight charges rendering it unprofitable to send it greater 

 distances except by water." 



