364 Recent Wiltshire Books, Pamphlets, and Articles. 



April 13th ; Wilts County Mirror, Jan. 25th and April 19th ; Wiltshire 

 Times, April 6th ; Bristol Times and Mirror, April 15th ; whilst a 

 descriptive article with a good ground-plan appeared in the Times, April 

 9th, 1901, reprinted in Wiltshire Times, April 13th, 1901. 



" The Eelation of Stonehenge to English Royalty," an article in the 

 San Francisco Chronicle, March 31st, 1901, contains a curiously circum- 

 stantial account of the " facts " on which the superstition that the fall of 

 one of the stones presages the death of a monarch are said to be founded 

 — from this it appears that falls of stones foretold the deaths of Edw. I., 

 Edw. II., James II., Anne, George II., George IV., and "William IV. 

 Of these falls of "huge rocks" in 1830 and 1837 no record appears to 

 have been preserved " on this side." 



Stonehenge, Age and Origin of ; Astronomical 



Theories. By Washington Teasdale, F.R.A.S. Reprinted from 

 No. 7 Transactions of Leeds Astronomical Society, 1899. Pamphlet. 

 8vo. Pp. 8, with good collotype frontispiece of two views of Stonehenge 

 — " Pointer or Sunrise Stone " and " Axial View along Sunrise Line from 

 so-called altar." This pamphlet contains notes of a lecture delivered at 

 Leeds. The author traces the progress of the astronomical theory shortly 

 in its various forms from its origin in Dr. John Smith's " Choir Gaure " 

 in 1771 down to the present time, pointing out the absurdities of many 

 of the suppositions and arguments. The author himself considers the 

 theory of Ferguson, that the legend of Ambrosius in the 5th century is 

 substantially true, to be the most probable solution, as agreeing best 

 with the astronomical evidence. 



The Rev. J. M. Bacon, in Good Words, Dec, 1900, in an article 



on " Monumental Timekeepers," speaks of Stonehenge as the " Grandest 

 Sun Register in Europe," but he is refreshingly outspoken on the folly 

 of building up elaborate theories of its age based on minute calculations 

 derived from the present position of the stones, their orientation, and so 

 forth. 



The Bath Road, History, Fashion, and Frivolity 

 on an old Highway; by Charles Gr. Harper. 



The part of this gossiping book which is concerned with Wiltshire 

 begins at p. 73, where the Bath Road enters the county at Hungerford, 

 and ends on page 227, where it leaves it at Box. Littlecote and the 

 legend of Wild Darell, Froxfield, Savernake Forest, Marlborough, 

 Avebury and Silbury, Cherhill and its white horse, Calne (which the 

 author abuses), Chippenham and Maud Heath's Causeway, Pickwick and 

 Corsham, and Box, are in turn very lightly touched on and illustrated 

 with a number of sketches of Littlecote (View and The Haunted Chamber) 

 — Marlborough — Roadside Inn, Manton — Fyfield— ^Marlborough Downs 

 near West Overton — Avebury — Silbury Hill — The White Horse, Cherhill 



