By the Rev. Canon J. E. Jackson, F.S.A. 353 



of Downton, used to hold their courts there, and probably at the 

 Moot — though I am not able to produce evidence of the fact. 



Places in the open air were undoubtedly used for gathering- and 

 speechifying, in Scotland, in Iceland, and to this day in the Isle of 

 Man. In this part of England, in Wiltshire certainly, the sheriff 

 of the county held his " Turn/' as it was called, his court in the 

 king's name, at some well-known point, marked by an oak tree or 

 a big stone, in the open air. 



Downton Moot may have been used for military purposes : but it 

 can only be the merest guess-work and fancy that brings Chlorus, 

 or Vespasion, or any other ancient Roman general to this or that 

 camp. We have no such minute description of their movements, as 

 to be able to identify them with nicety. 



But about Downton there is a tradition which may, perhaps, 

 commend itself to your acceptance, seeing it relates to a hero of 

 your own county. The tradition is that it was a residence of Sir 

 Bevis, of Southampton : perhaps used by him when he bravely 

 defended the south coast to prevent Hampshire falling into the 

 hands of the Danes. That there was such a hero there can be no 

 doubt, because they still show his very sword at Arundel Castle ! 

 Not only is his very sword to be soen, but the man himself. His 

 effigy at least, in stone, stands as a sentinel on one side of the town 

 gate of Southampton, and his formidable antagonist, Ascapart, on the 

 other. There is a hill called Bevis Mount at that town : and I have 

 already mentioned the site of an earthwork near Conholt, called 

 Bevis-bury. His achievements, with not a little poetical exaggera- 

 tion, are duly recorded in a famous old romance, written in Norman 

 French, printed in black letter, folio, with double columns, called 

 " Beuves de Hanton " : a story full of marvellous narrative of giants, 

 dragons, and fair ladies : very amusing and exciting, no doubt, to our 

 remote forefathers, sitting in their dreary castles by their winter 

 firesides. Mr. Ellis, in his book called " Metrical Romances/' gives 

 an abridgment of your great champion's history, " with a liveliness 

 which extracts amusement even out of the most rude and unpromising 

 of our old tales of chivalry." So says Sir Walter Scott, who also, 

 in his introduction to Marmion, mentions the hero himself. He 



