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rations of the monument, in all of which it seems to be assumed that 

 there were no further constructions above the line of imposts, either of 

 the external ring or of any of the contained trilithons. There also 

 appears great difficulty in applying the language of Henry to the sur- 

 rounding ring of pillar stones, connected as they still are to a considera- 

 ble extent, by a continuous cornice, depriving them of the appear- 

 ance of detached doors or gateways. This cornice is composed of a 

 series of imposts, mortised on the under face into tenons wrought on 

 the heads of the supporting pillar stones. Each pillar has two tenons, 

 which lock respectively into the mortises of two contiguous imposts 

 abutting over the centre of the pillar, so that all the spaces, when per- 

 fect — as probably they were seven hundred years ago — were spanned 

 by a continuous series of imposts. In the arrangement of the internal 

 trilithons the case is different. Each pair of pillars here supports, or 

 supported, a single impost, covering the whole breadth of both supports 

 and the space between, and locking by two mortises on its under face 

 into a single tenon on each pillar. Each trilithon, or group of three, thus 

 presents the appearance of a lofty isolated gate or doorway. This image is 

 the same which presented itself to Olaus Magnus four hundred years 

 later, when describing a similar trilithic monument, and which I be- 

 lieve is the only other megalithic structure of that kind in Western 

 Europe of which any evidence exists, between Scara and Kelby, in the 

 south of Sweden: — "Mira compagine immensa saxa in modum altissima3 

 latissirnseque januaa sursum transversumque labore gigantum erect se ;" 

 i. e. "a, structure of huge rocks, raised by the efforts of giants, with a 

 wonderful connexion, in the form of a very lofty and wide doorway." 

 (" De Gent. Sep." 1. i. ; c. 30), and he annexes a rude drawing of the mo- 

 nument (1. i. c. 29) ; and Stowe, in his " Annals" (p. 53), applies the 

 same language to the trilithons of Stonehenge — " Every couple sus- 

 taineth a third stone, lying overthwart gate-wise." But the language 

 of Henry seems to intimate that in his time some of those gate-like 

 constructions had other trilithons of a similar kind erected over them ; 

 and a circumstance taken notice of by me, and by an accurate observer 

 who accompanied me on a visit to Stonehenge in September, 1863, 

 affords grounds, independently of the passage from Henry, for surmising 

 that, in regard to at least one of the trilithons, such an upper storey, if 

 I may so call it, did formerly exist. 



It will be in the recollection of those members of the Academy who 

 have seen Stonehenge, or looked at representations or models of it, that 

 the lintel or impost of the central trilithon has fallen ; and those who 

 have seen it lying at the foot of the leaning pillar- stone which once 

 formed one of its supports, will remember the emotion excited by its vast 

 size, and the surprising height to which it had once been elevated. It is 

 now a little more than fifteen feet long by three feet nine inches broad, 

 and two feet nine inches thick. Its southern end has been pushed forward 

 in its descent by the fall of the supporting pillar-stone at that side, which 

 now lies prostrate, broken in two, with its upper end within a few feet 



