118 Vestiges of (he Earliest Inhabitants of Wiltshire. 



district, in which their tribe was settled, as they were invited by 

 the season and abundance of pasture for their flocks. We may 

 still see throughout our Downs many a bank and ditch, some of 

 which may have been lines of boundary and defence, and others 

 fences for the protection of their flocks and herds : and here and 

 there we may observe a mark of enclosure, sometimes taking the 

 form of a square, more frequently an oblong, which are supposed 

 to be the vestiges of the cattle pens of these, the earliest shepherds 

 of the Down. 1 



The next step from pasturage has been in all countries to agri- 

 culture : 2 but inasmuch as the latter entails a considerable amount 

 of skill as well as of physical exertion, this step has generally not 

 been taken until after a wide interval. In Britain, it scarcely 

 seems to have been practised at all by the original Celtic tribes : 

 but when the Belgse, a colony more advanced in civilization, 3 

 crossed over from Belgium in the second or third century B.C. 

 they began to cultivate the soil near the sea coast : 4 and it may 

 astonish some of our agriculturalists on the Downs to learn, as we 

 do from Pliny, that the method they so often pursue, of " rubbling 

 the land," as we call it in Wiltshire, or manuring it with chalky 

 marie, was practised here 2000 years ago by the Belgse. The fact 

 is so interesting to us Wiltshiremen, thst I cannot help quoting 

 the passage from Pliny which records it. 5 " The people of Gaul 

 and Britain " (he says) " have found out another kind of manure 

 for their grounds : which is a fat clay or earth called ' marie/ of 

 which they entertain a very high opinion. Of those marles which 

 are esteemed the fattest, the white ones are most valuable : of these 



l SivR. Hoare's Ancient Wilts, vol. i., 179, 190, &c, vol. ii„ 10, 106, &c, 

 and passim. 



2 Henry's History of Great Britain, vol. ii., p. 97, chap. v. 

 3 Csesar Comment : de Bell : Gall: liv. v., cap. 12. 

 Carte's History of England, p. 76. 

 Sharon Turner's History of England, vol. i., p. 67. 

 Prichard's Celtic Nations, p. 110. 



4 Prichard's Physical History of Mankind, vol. ii., pp. 106 — 109. 

 "Pliny's Natural History, lib. xvii., c. 6. 

 Lingard's History of England, vol. i.. p. 11. 

 Henry's History of England, vol. ii., p. 97, chap. v. 



