198 



the height of the supports would probably be about the measure of the 

 distance to which their fall would cast the lintel resting on them. It 

 lies north-east by south-west, at a distance of about ten feet from the 

 foot of the central trilithon, and nearly but not quite parallel to its 

 inner face, as it originally stood. 



Supposing such a superstructure to have existed, it may be asked 

 what bearing would that fact have on the question of the age or uses of 

 the monument ? I shall venture no further in speculation than to ob- 

 serve, that the gateway erected over the gateway is a form of comme- 

 morative monument in the East, and that if anything in the construction 

 of Stonehenge looked to an Eastern model, it would probably turn the 

 scale which has lately hung in pretty even balance between a post- 

 Roman and a pre-Celtic date for its erection. A remarkable example of 

 the Eastern form of monument may be seen in " Eergusson's Picturesque 

 Illustrations of Indian Architecture," where the details are given of a 

 structure of this kind, of three stories, forming part of the enceinte of a 

 sepulchral tope at Sanchee, near Billah, in Central India. The rest of 

 the enclosure is composed of stone pillars carrying a continuous impost, 

 and so much in the Stonehenge taste, that the writer (p. 22) queries, 

 " Are these the originals of the trilithons of Stonehenge?" The same 

 species of monuments occur in variously modified forms throughout 

 Tartary and the remote East. Several examples may be seen under 

 the head " Pailoos," in the " Handbook of Architecture" by the same 

 writer (pp. 137 et seq.). 



A sculptured object, ten inches in length, observed by Dr. Tate in 

 1861, which attracted the attention of the British Association at their 

 Bath meeting in September, 1864, exists about midway between the 

 mortises on the under surface of the fallen impost. It is nearly sym- 

 metrical with the lines of the stone, six inches nearer the southern 

 mortise, and leans towards the south. It consists of a straight upright 

 line, broadly hollowed out, and with an appearance of antiquity, having 

 at top a curve similar to a reaping-hook, or a Roman letter q reversed, 

 and below a smaller curve of the same character turned the opposite 

 way. The curved portions of the sculpture appear to be sharply incised, 

 having an angular section and a modern aspect ; but they also bear the 

 appearance of having been hacked and gone over recently with some tool, 

 so that there is a difficulty in saying that the whole may not be ancient. 

 It bears a generic resemblance to an object sculptured on one of the 

 stones of the sepulchral chambers of the Butte of Tumiac in the Mor- 

 bihan. The letters LY inscribed within the upper curve appear to be 

 modern. 



The tendency of recent explorations is to throw back the period of 

 monuments of this class. The possibility that an examination of the 

 lower surface of the so-called "altar stone" at Stonehenge might 

 disclose some constructive or other traces calculated to explain the lan- 

 guage of Henry, induces me to observe, that the pressure both of the 



