244 
AN ENGLISH VENICE. 
present surface, there have been found many articles, which, no 
doubt, had, in the course of years, been dropped into the water and 
lost. To these I shall again refer. A most interesting structure 
on this side the village is the “causeway,” a long bank of clay, 
into the surface of which are pressed pieces of stone, brought 
probably from Ham Hill or the Mendips, and forming a rough 
pavement. For some distance the causeway runs due north, then 
it turns sharply to the south-east. It has been suggested that this 
was a device for the defence of the village ; to begin with, the 
causeway was very likely below the surface of the murky waters, 
and therefore difficult of discovery by enemies who did not know 
its exact position ; did they find it, however, then, as they made a 
rush along it, coming to the sharp turn, they would almost 
certainly go plunging headlong into the morass, from which there 
was but little chance of escape. 
The articles to which reference was made above, as having been 
dug out of the peat, throw a very interesting light on the mode of 
life and degree of civilisation of the inhabitants of this prehistoric 
Venice ; that their skill in carpentry was by no means small, is 
shown by the morticed timber, which is of excellent workmanship, 
and, perhaps, not to be surpassed at the present day. A boat, 
seventeen feet long, has been discovered, and quantities of pottery 
both wheel and hand-made, sling-stones, bones of animals, rings, 
knives, saws, files, weapons, combs, needles, pins, stamps for orna¬ 
menting pottery, querns, &c., composed of bronze, iron, horn, bone, 
or stone, as the case may be, and strangely shaped pieces of wood, 
the use of which is not certainly known. These ancient Britons 
had weaving-looms and weaving-combs; they used safety-pins ; 
they possessed horses, sheep, and cattle ; they gathered nuts, they 
grew corn, they indulged in cock-fighting, and, perhaps, also in 
cannibalism. 
What was the position of this people in British history is, of 
course, an important question. Professor Boyd-Dawkins thinks 
they belonged to the long-headed division of the prehistoric 
Britons, and lived some fifty or a hundred years before Roman 
. established in England. According to Dr. 
November, 1893. 
