60 



On British Stone and Earthworks 



and a part of this we shall traverse on Thursday morning, when we 

 leave Barbury Castle. It is sometimes known as the " Ridge-way " \ 

 from its general position, skirting, as it does, for the most part, the 

 ridge of the hills. This trackway descending from Salisbury Plain j 

 near Redholn turnpike, crosses the Pewsey Vale, where it leaves j 

 traces of its course in the names of Broad Street and Honey Street, ] 

 ascends the hill near the village of Alton, and may be traced as itij 

 steers for East Kennet, crossing Wansdyke on its way. Thence it| 

 pursues a northern direction, till it reaches Hackpen Hill, whence it ; 

 winds along the edge of the line of hills stretching towards Barbury, j 

 and from thence passes on by Liddington Castle into Berkshire. I 

 Even to the present day this old British road is to some extent used; f 

 but before turnpikes were abolished, it was generally frequented by j 

 drovers, who conducted their cattle through the whole length of the j 

 county, with scarce any deviation on the hard roads : and, within j 

 the memory of living men, was taken advantage of by smugglers, j 

 who carried their contraband goods from the southern coasts into I 

 the heart of England by this lonely and unfrequented route. 



(3) Of " Pit-dwellings/'' or the vestiges of a British village, well 

 can hardly find a better example than is to be seen on Huish Hill, I 

 which we purpose to visit to-morrow. Occupying a long tract of 

 down, and irregular in plan ; formed on no system, but protected in ; 

 a measure by banks and ditches, and having a communication with! 

 the adjoining camp by means of a covered road, these unsymmetrical j 

 pits offer a very perfect specimen of a British village which hasf 

 never received additions from a more modern nation, but is entirely j 

 original and purely British. Such is the substance of the account 1 

 of them which was given by Sir Richard Hoare sixty years ago, 1 ! 

 and from that t time to this, no Archaeologist has arisen to throw any! ' 

 light on these mysterious dwellings, or (so far as I know) to pursue f 

 the enquiry as to their relative positions, their original shape or their i 

 structure ; albeit an enquiry of undoubted interest, but to be pursued 

 only at an expenditure of hard work with the pick and the spade, 

 not to mention much dogged resolution and much determined per- 1 

 severance. Other examples of these pit-dwellings we shall see onj 

 1 Ancient Wilts, page 11. 



