tower on the summit. This tower is easy of ascent, and affords very fine views on all sides. It was intended to be twenty feet higher than it is, but the force of the wind upon it was too great, and the surrounding belt of beech trees had to be planted to protect it.

The entrenchments of the adjoining camp reached as far as the iron tower, but the late owner of the estate, Mr. Richard Blakemore, paid but little respect to them. He levelled the entrenchments and filled up the ditches to make a straight road into the centre of the camp, and thus destroyed its original configuration on this side.

The Little Doward Camp is of considerable size, including the whole summit of the hill. The northern position, irregularly oval in shape, with an area of fourteen acres, is enclosed by a single defence on the steep side towards the river, but with double embankments and ditches on the northern and western sides; towards the south the other portion of the camp exists, with an area of six acres, and this part has the natural protection of perpendicular rocks. Several mounds or tumuli are said to exist within and around the camp, and towards the higher portion is a large low square mound, but the whole surface is so irregular and so overgrown with bracken that it would require a much longer time than could then be given to examine them. If the young shoots or fronds of the bracken on the camp were but mown off in the spring after they have shot about a foot from the ground, and once again afterwards for a couple of years, several acres of good fresh herbage could be secured for the deer, and the camp itself would regain much of the interest which is now so sadly obscured.

Tradition states this camp to be originally British, one of the camps from which Caractacus was driven by the Romans, and that it afterwards became a Roman camp. It is very possible, and indeed probable, that both surmises are correct, but like most of the camps which occupy the hills of Herefordshire, the history of this one can only be surmised from tradition and from the extent and character of its own entrenchments. If the British occupied it, it was probably as a British town, secured from any sudden seizure by a stockade in addition. The Romans would certainly drive the Britons or anyone else from the camp, since it commanded not only the river below, but the road on the other side, which was their highway from Isca Silurum (Caerleon) through Blestium (Monmouth) to Ariconium beyond Ross, which last place may be said to have been the Merthyr Tydvil of the Romans. This road is described in the Iter of Antonine. It is very probable, too, that the high position of this camp may have been very useful to the Romans as a signal station, and the square mound may possibly have formed the base of the semaphore signal stand, since the views from it are wide and extensive, and in direct connection, for example, with Monmouth on the one side, and the Chase above Ross camp on the other. There is, however, one great obstacle to the possibility of continuous occupation of this camp by anybody, and that is the want of water. There is no spring on the hill, and therefore any occupation must depend on the supply of rain water, unless they could fetch fresh water from the valley. No Roman remains have ever been found in it.

On the opposite side of the river, on the high ground above the present

railway station, are two lines of entrenchment commanding the roads, which tradition states to have guarded a camp to which the Romans retreated after an engagement.

The following communication from the Rev. T. W. Webb has been kindly sent to the Secretary ::

"Hardwick Vicarage, Hay, R.S.O.,

"19th August, 1884.

"Dear Sir,-As I fear I cannot look forward to the pleasure of joining your party on the 25th instant, which would have been very interesting to me from old associations, as I was curate of Ganarew, and in continual sight of Little Doward, for three years, may I beg permission to send you a few remarks on the subject of the camp on that hill, in the hope that they may at any rate lead to some interesting inquiry and discussion.

"I went to live at Ganarew in the year 1851, and found that the then proprietor of the Leys (now called I think Wyastone), Mr. R. Blakemore, being entirely unacquainted with the antiquarian interest attached to his property, had been making such alterations in the entrenchments as at any rate elicited a feeling of thankfulness that his activity had not proceeded further in that direction. The enclosed extracts from a contemporary note-book of mine will give some idea of the extent of the mischief, to which is to be added that he had everywhere taken off the summit of the rampart to make a walk upon it—a fact which has to be allowed for in estimating the original strength of the position.

"I do not very well recollect the barrows, but my impression is that they were for the most part in the Little Bailey, and that they had not a sepulchral aspect, being flat and low. One in particular had a projection on one side, giving it a rude likeness to the letter T. If I recollect aright, they had narrow and shallow trenches round them.

"As to the story of the skeleton, I have since had a misgiving that I misinterpreted the word 'joint' employed by my informant, and that he really meant 'giant.'

"And I do not feel sure that the story may not be a modified reproduction of an old account of the discovery of a huge skeleton, which is, I think, related in Heath's book on the Wye Tour, to which I cannot at present refer, but hope that some member of the Club may be more fortunate in this respect.

"There is a passage in the History of Geoffrey of Monmouth, which, as far as I know, has not been adverted to in connection with this fortified summit, but which may possibly be thought worthy of some attention. He says, lib. viii., § 2, concerning Aurelius Ambrosius: 'Convertit exercitum suum in Cambriam, oppidumque Genoreu petivit. Diffugerat enim eò Vortigernus, ut tutum refugium haberet. Erat autem oppidum illud in natione Hergin super fluvium Ganiæ, in monte qui Cloarius nuncupatur.' Then follows an imaginary speech of Aurelius to Eidol, and at the close: 'Nec mora, diversis machinaturibus incumbent, monia diruere nituntur. Postremo, cum cætera defecissent, ignem adhibuerunt : qui cum alimentum reparisset, non acquievit adjunctus, donec turrim et Vortigernum exarsit.'

"Here there can be no question as to the meaning of the names Hergin (Ergyng) and Genoreu (Gan-y-rhiw), and it seems very possible that Ganice may be a clerical error for Gauice, or some such equivalent for Gwy, while those acquainted with ancient inaccuracies may perhaps think that in Cloarius we may find the trace of Doarius, and the expression oppidum' is in some sense borne out by the present name of the wood that clothes the south side of the hill, Dennis (Dinas) Grove. It is not unlikely, as it appears to me, that Geoffrey's acquaintance with so remarkable a hill fortress in his own immediate neighbourhood may have induced a wish to introduce it into his history, notwithstanding the received tradition that Vortigern met with his fate, and is buried, in Caernarvonshire.

"I hope that in venturing these remarks, on a subject of great interest to myself, I may not have seemed to trespass too much upon your time, or on the attention of the Woolhope Club, should you consider them worthy of being communicated to it; and I remain, dear Sir, yours faithfully,

"THOMAS WILLIAM WEBB."

LITTLE DOWARD.

(Extract from a MS. note-book, by the Rev. T. W. Webb, at that time curate of Ganarew, in which parish the camp is situated, dated June 27th, 1850.)

"Mr. Blakemore's man, Furber, who remembers the entrenchments before they were touched, told me that the large rampart is called the Great-the smaller one the Little-Bailey (Brili, a mound or court-Welsh). In order to build the iron tower, Mr. Blakemore levelled all the end of the outer rampart, throwing the earth and stones over on the side of the wood, not back into the camp-it was merely a continuous mound to the end of the hill where the tower stands, without any tumulus at the end. Mr. Blakeinore also cut half through the rest of this entrenchment longitudinally. There was always an entrance at the junction of the two valla, and the great entrance farther on is unaltered; so is the entrance from the one enclosure to the other. The deep trench across which this last-mentioned interior entrance passes has always been interrupted in places as it is (it strikes me that this might have been to catch rain-water). He recollects and was present at the finding of a quantity of bones. They were three small handbaskets full-more than a bushel in all-two skulls amongst them, but many appeared to be bones of sheep. They were found twenty yards deep, in what he called an old mine, which Mr. Blakemore cleared out, and where a windlass is still standing. In various other parts, where Mr. Blakemore is now making 'caves' on the side over the river, they are still meeting with bones. Somewhere near the entrenchment, Furber and others found a quantity of rusty iron, about six feet beneath the surface; it is, he thinks, at the front door at the Leys, but is much shorter now than when it was found. No coins have ever been found. (Thomas Dance told me some time ago that he had heard that John Ellaway had found coins formerly.) He thinks there are more than six barrows on the summit. (I counted six a short time ago—one in great measure destroyed.")—T.W.W.