Recent Wiltshire Books, Pamphlets, and Articles. 67 



I olaim to have discovered the original form of the tunes. They were taken 

 down from the mouths of old men, who in some cases had not sung them for 

 years. I have in no case patched up a melody. As with the words, so 

 with the tanes, those songs are given here exactly as they were sung; 

 while the accompaniments, for which I alone am responsible, are purposely 

 simple and unobtrusive." There are a few short notes on the origin of 

 the various songs at the end. The songs aud carols are nine in number : — 

 Long time I've travelled in the North Countrie — The Taking of Quebec 

 — The Labouring Man — Ye Sons of Albion — Botany Bay — There was a 

 Rich Merchant — Oh, where beest Gwying — Two Britford Carols. 



There seem? little that is distinctively of Wiltshire about these songs, 

 beyond the fact that they were sung in the county— but it is a good work 

 to rescue both tunes and words from oblivion, especially if Mr. Hill 

 purposes— as apparently he does — to give us more of them in the future. 



Marlborough College Natural History Society. 

 Report No. 46, for the year 1897. This report, as usual, 



contains the record of steady and accurate work in both Botany and 

 Entomology, twenty-one species of Lepidoptera having been added to the 

 local list duriug the year, and three new species of plants, including 

 Scirpus pauciftorus and Carex distant, from Chilton, whilst Geranium 

 rotundifolium and Tulipa sylvestris have been re-discovered. The most 

 notable ornithological event recorded is the finding of a Fulmar in the 

 forest after a gale. The usual lists of botanical, entomological, meteoro- 

 logical, and anthropometrical observations are given. An excellent photo- 

 print is given of an Elizabethan carving of Moses striking the rock, which 

 coming originally from the " White House," pulled down to make way 

 for the College Sick-Room, after lying by in a lumber-room for years is 

 now to find a home, probably in the Common-Room of the College. There 

 are also two photographic views of " Treacle Bolly " and " Sheep Washing, 

 Marlborough." The most interesting thing dealt with in this report, however, 

 is the finding of five very curious urns about 18in. below the surface of the 

 ground, embedded in the gravel, during the digging of the foundations for 

 the new wing of the Sanatorium. They stood in the ground mouth 

 upwards within a space of a few square yards, without any covering. 

 Both in shape and ornamentation they are quite unlike any vessels found 

 in this neighbourhood of either British or Roman make. The only thing 

 which helps to fix their date is the presence of an iron tang in a stag's 

 horn knife-handle found with them. This goes to prove them to be of 

 later date than the Bronze Age, but proves nothing else. Mr. Meyrick 

 thinks that they are funerary urns of Romano-British date, and that 

 there are probably more in the unexcavated ground close by. An illus- 

 tration is given of the most perfect of these pots. 



Wiltshire Notes and Queries, No. 20, Dec. 1897. 



This number opens with the first instalment of an account of the family 

 of Estcourt of Swinley, by M. E. Light, illustrated by a nice sketch of 



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