Chapter X: Happy England (2)

We know from Cæsar that the Gauls who were "extremely devoted to superstitious rites," sent their young men to Britain for instruction in Druidic philosophy: we also know that it was customary when a war was declared to vow all captured treasures to the gods: "In many states you may see piles of these things heaped up in their consecrated spots, nor does it often happen that anyone disregarding the sanctity of the case dares either to secrete in his house things captured or take away those deposited: and the most severe punishment with torture has been established for such a deed".[647] As British customs "did not differ much" from those of Gaul it is thus almost a certainty that Stonehenge was for long periods a vast national treasure-house and Valhalla.

Notwithstanding the abundance of barrows, earthworks, and other evidences of prehistoric population it is probable that Salisbury Plain was always a green spot, and we are safe in assuming that Choir Gawr was the seat of Gorsedds. By immemorial law and custom the Gorsedd had always to be held on a green spot, in a conspicuous place in full view and hearing of country and aristocracy, in the face of the sun, the Eye of Light, and under the expansive freedom of the sky that all might see and hear. As _sedum_ is the Latin for _seat_, and there seems to be some uncertainty as to what the term Gorsedd really meant, I may be permitted to throw out the suggestion that it was a Session, Seat, or Sitting of the Gaurs or Augurs: by Matthew Arnold the British Gorsedd is described as the "oldest educational institution in Europe," and moreover as an institution not known out of Britain.

Slightly over a mile from Stonehenge or Choir Gawr is the nearest village now known as Amesbury, originally written Ambrosbury or Ambresbury: here was the meeting-place of Synods even in historic times, and here was a monastery which is believed to have taken its name from Ambrosius Aurelius, a British chief. It is more probable that the monastery and the town were alike dedicated to the "Saint" Ambrose, particulars of whose life may be found in De Voragine's _Golden Legend_. According to this authority the name Ambrose may be said "of _ambor_ in Greek which is to say as father of light, and _soir_ that is a little child, that is a father of many sons by spiritual generations, clear and full of light". Or, says De Voragine, "Ambrose is said of a stone named _ambra_ which is much sweet, oderant, and precious, and also it is much precious in the church". That amber was likewise precious in the eyes of the heathen is obvious from its frequent presence in prehistoric tombs, and from the vast estimation in which it was held by the Druids. Not only was the golden amber esteemed as an emblem of the golden sun, but its magical magnetic properties caused it to be valued by the ancients as even more precious than gold. There was also a poetic notion connecting amber and Apollo, thus expressed by a Greek poet:--

The Celtic sages a tradition hold
That every drop of amber was a tear
Shed by Apollo when he fled from heaven
For sorely did he weep and sorrowing passed
Through many a doleful region till he reached
The sacred Hyperboreans.[648]

It will be remembered that Salisbury Plain was sometimes known as Ellendown, with which name may be connoted the statement of Pausanias that Olen the Hyperborean was the first prophet of Delphi.[649]

On turning to _The Golden Legend_ we seem to get a memory of the Tears of Apollo in the statement that St. Ambrose was of such great compassion "that when any confessed to him his sin he wept so bitterly that he would make the sinner to weep". The sympathies of St. Ambrose, and his astonishing tendency to dissolve into tears, are again emphasised by the statement that he wept sore even when he heard of the demise of any bishop, "and when it was demanded of him why he wept for the death of good men for he ought better to make joy, because they went to Heaven," Ambrose made answer that he shed tears because it was so difficult to find any man to do well in such offices. The legend continues, "He was of so great stedfastness and so established in his purpose that he would not leave for dread nor for grief that might be done to him". In connection with this proverbial _constancy_ it may be noted that at the village of _Constantine_ there is a Longstone--the largest in Cornwall--measuring 20 feet high and known as Maen Amber, or the Amber Stone: this was apparently known also as Men _Perhen_, and was broken up into gateposts in 1764. In the same parish is a shaped stone which Borlase describes as "like the Greek letter omega, somewhat resembling a cap": from the illustration furnished by Borlase it is evident that this monument is a _knob_ very carefully modelled and the measurements recorded, 30 feet in girth, _eleven_ feet high,[650] imply that it was imminently an Elphinstone, Perhenstone, or Bryanstone. With this constantly recurrent combination of 30 and 11 feet, may here be connoted the measurements of the walls of Richborough or Rutupiæ: according to the locally-published _Short Account_ "the north wall is the most perfect of the three that remain, 10 feet 8 inches in thickness and nearly 30 feet in height; the winding courses of tiles to the outer facing are in nearly their original state".[651] The winding courses here mentioned consists of five rows of a red brick, and if one allows for inevitable _detritus_ the original measurements of the quadrangle walls may reasonably be assumed as having been 30 × 11 feet: the solid mass of masonry upon which Rutupiæ's cross is superimposed reaches "downward about 30 feet from the surface". Four or five hundred yards from the castle and upon the very summit of the hill are the remains of an amphitheatre in the form of an egg measuring 200 × 160 feet. To this, the first _walled_ amphitheatre discovered in the country, there were three entrances upon inclined planes, North, South, and West.

The first miracle recorded of St. Ambrose is to the effect that when an infant lying in the cradle a swarm of bees descended on his mouth; then they departed and flew up in the air so high that they might not be seen. Greek mythology relates that the infant Zeus was fed by bees in his cradle upon Mount Ida, and a variant of the same fairy-tale represents Zeus as feeding daily in Ambrosia--

The blessed Gods those rooks Erratic call.
Birds cannot pass them safe, no, not the doves
Which his ambrosia bear to Father Jove.[652]

Ambrosia, the fabled food of the gods, appears to have been honey: it is said that the Amber stones were anointed with Ambrosia, hence it is significant to find in immediate proximity to each other the place-names Honeycrock and Amberstone in Sussex. The Russians have an extraordinary idea that Ambrosia emanated from horses' heads,[653] and as there is a "Horse Eye Level" closely adjacent to the Sussex Honeycrock and Amberstone we may assume that the neighbouring Hailsham, supposed to mean "Home of Aela or Eile," was originally an Ellie or Elphin Home. Layamon refers to Stonehenge, "a plain that was pleasant besides Ambresbury," as Aelenge, which probably meant Ellie or Elphin meadow, for _ing_ or _inge_ was a synonym for meadow. The correct assumption may possibly be that all flowery meads were the recognised haunts of the anges or ingles: the fairy rings are usually found in meadows, and the poets feigned Proserpine in a meadow gathering flowers ere she was ravished below by Pluto: as late as 1788 an English poet expressed the current belief, "'Tis said the fairy people meet beneath the bracken shade on _mead_ and hill".

Across the Sussex mead known as Horse Eye Level runs a "Snapsons Drove": Snap is a curious parental name and is here perhaps connected with Snave, a Kentish village, presumably associated with _San Aphe_ or _San Ap_.[654] Not only was the hipha or hobby horse decorated with a knop or knob, but a radical feature of its performance seems to have been movable jaws with which by means of a string the actor snapped at all and sundry: were these snappers, I wonder, the origin of the Snapes and Snapsons? In view of the fact that the surname Leaper is authoritatively connoted with an entry in a fifteenth century account-book: "To one that _leped_ at Chestre 6s. 8d.," the suggestion may possibly be worth consideration.

In Sussex there are two Ambershams and an Amberley: in Hants is Amberwood. St. Ambrose is recorded to have been born in Rome, whence it is probable that he was the ancient divinity of _Umbria_: in Derbyshire there is a river Amber, and in Yorkshire a Humber, which the authorities regard as probably an aspirated form of _cumber_, "confluence". The magnetic properties of _amber_, which certainly cause a _humber_ or confluence, may have originated this meaning; in any case _cumber_ and _umber_ are radically the same word. Probably Humberstones and Amberstones will be found on further inquiry to be as plentiful as Prestons or Peri stones: there is a Humberstone in Lincolnshire, another at Leicester, near Bicester is Ambrosden, and at Epping Forest is Ambresbury. This Epping Ambresbury, known alternatively as Ambers' Banks, is admittedly a British _oppidum_: the remains cover 12 acres of ground and are situated on the highest plateau in the forest. As there is an Ambergate near _Bux_ton it is noteworthy that Ambers' Banks in Epping are adjacent to Beak Hill, Buckhurst Hill, and High Beech Green. I have already connoted Puck or Bogie with the beech tree, and it is probable that Fairmead Plain by High Beech Green was the Fairy mead where once the pixies gathered: close by is Bury Wood, and there is no doubt the neighbourhood of Epping and Upton was always very British.

In old English _amber_ or _omber_ meant a pitcher--query a honey-crock[655]--whence the authorities translate the various Amberleys as _meadow of the pitcher_, and Ambergate, near Buxton, as "probably pitcher road". The Amber Hill near Boston, we are told, "will be from Old English _amber_ from its shape," but as it is extremely unusual to find hills in the form of a pitcher this etymology seems questionable. At the Wiltshire Ambresbury there is a Mount Ambrosius at the foot of which, according to local tradition, used to exist a college of Druidesses,[656] in which connection it is noteworthy that just as Silbury Hill is distant about a mile from the Avebury Circle, so Mount Ambrosius is equally distant from Choir Gawr.

To Amber may be assigned the words _umpire_ and _empire_; Oberon, the lovely child, is haply described as the _Emperor_ of Fairyland, whence also no doubt he was the lord and master of the _Empyrean_. When dealing elsewhere with the word _amber_ I suggested that it meant radically _Sun Father_,[657] and there are episodes in the life of St. Ambrose which support this interpretation, _e.g._, "it happened that an enchanter called devils to him and sent them to St. Ambrose for to annoy and grieve him, but the devils returned and said that they might not approach to his gate because there was a great fire all about his house". Among the Persians it was customary to halo their divinities, not with a circle but with a pyre or pyramid of fire, and in all probability to the _auburn_ Auberon the Emperor of the Empyrean may be assigned not only _burn_ and _brand_, but also _bran_ in the sense of bran new. That St. Ambrose was Barnaby Bright or the White god of day is implied by the anecdote "a fire in the manner of a shield covered his head, and entered into his mouth: then became his face as white as any snow, and anon it came again to his first form".[658] The basis of this story would seem to have been a picture representing Ambrose with fire not entering into, but _emerging from_, his mouth and forming a surrounding halo "in the manner of a shield". _Embers_ now mean ashes, and the Ember Days of Christianity probably trace backward to the immemorial times of prehistoric fire-worship. At Parton, near Salisbury, one meets with the curious surname Godber: and doubtless inquiry would establish a connection between this Godber of Parton and Godfrey.

The weekly fair at Ambresbury used to be held on _Fri_day; the maid Freya, to whom Friday owes its name, was evidently _Fire Eye_; the Latin _feriæ_ were the hey-days or holidays dedicated to some fairy. Fairs were held customarily on the festival of the local saint, frequently even to-day within ancient earthworks: the most famous Midsummer Fair used to be that held at _Barnwell_: Feronia, the ancient Italian divinity at whose festival a great fair was held, and the first-fruits of the field offered, is, as has been shown, equivalent to Beronia or Oberon.

According to Borlase there is in Anglesea "a horse-shoe 22 paces in diameter called Brangwyn or Supreme court; it lies in a place called Tre'r Drew or Druids' Town".[659] Stonehenge consists of a circle enclosing a horse-shoe or hoof--the footprint and sign of Hipha the White Mare, or Ephialtes the Night Mare, and a variant of this idea is expressed in the circle enclosing a triangle as exhibited in the Christian emblem on p. 571. That Christianity did not always conceive the All Father as the Ancient of Days is evident from Fig. 341, where the central Power is depicted within the _writhings_ of what is seemingly an acanthus _wreath_: the CUNOB fairy on the British coin illustrated _ante_, page 528, is extending what is either a ball of fire or else a wreath. The word _wraith_, meaning apparition, is connoted by Skeat with an Icelandic term meaning "a pile of stones to warn a wayfarer," hence this _heap_ may be connoted with _rath_ the Irish, and _rhaith_ the Welsh, for a fairy dun or hill. Skeat further connotes _wraith_ with the Norwegian word _vardyvle_, meaning "a guardian or attendant spirit seen to follow or precede one," and he suggests that _vardyvle_ meant _ward evil_. Certainly the _wraiths_ who haunted the raths were supposed to ward off evil, and the giant Wreath,[660] who was popularly associated with Port_reath_ near _Redruth_, was in all probability the same _wraith_ that originated the place-name Cape Wrath. In Welsh a speech is called _ar raith_ or on the mound, hence we may link _rhe_toric to this idea, and assume that the raths were the seats of public eloquence as we know they were.

As wreath means a circle it is no doubt the same word as _rota_, a wheel, and Rodehengenne or Stonehengels may have meant the Wheel Angels. The cruciform _rath_, illustrated _ante_, page 55, is pre-eminently a _rota_, and in Fig. 343 Christ is represented in a circle supported by four somewhat unaerial Evangelists or Angels.

Mount Ida in Phrygia was the reputed seat of the _Dactyli_, a word which means _fingers_, and these mysterious Powers were sometimes identified with the Cabiri. The Dactyli, or _fingers_, are described as fabulous beings to whom the discovery of iron and the art of working it by means of fire was ascribed, and as the philosophy of Phairie is always grounded upon some childishly simple basis, it is probable that the Elphin eleven in its elementary sense represented the ten fingers controlled by Emperor Brain. The digits are magic little workmen who level mountains and rear palaces at the bidding of their lord and master Brain: the word _digit_, French _doight_, is in fact _Good god_, and _dactyli_ is the same word plus a final _yli_.

In _Folklore as an Historical Science_ Sir Laurence Gomme lays some stress upon a tale which is common alike to Britain and Brittany, and is therefore supposed to be of earlier date than the separation of Britons and Bretons. This tale which centres at London, is to the effect that a countryman once upon a time dreamed there was a priceless treasure hidden at London Bridge: he therefore started on a quest to London where on arrival he was observed loitering and was interrogated by a bystander. On learning the purpose of his trip the Cockney laughed heartily at such simplicity, and jestingly related how he himself had also dreamed a dream to the effect that there was treasure buried in the countryman's own village. On his return home the rustic, thinking the matter over, decided to dig where the cockney had facetiously indicated, whereupon to his astonishment he actually found a pot containing treasure. On the first pot unearthed was an inscription reading--

Look lower, where this stood
Is another twice as good.

Encouraged he dug again, whereupon to his greater astonishment he found a second pot bearing the same inscription: again he dug and found a third pot even yet more valuable. This fabulously ancient tale is notably identified with Upsall in Yorkshire; it is, we are told, "a constant tradition of the neighbourhood, and the identical bush yet exists (or did in 1860) beneath which the treasure was found; a _bur_tree or elder."[661] Upsall was originally written Upeshale and Hupsale (primarily Ap's Hall?) and the idea is a happy one, for in mythology it is undeniably true that the deeper one delves the richer proves the treasure trove. In suggesting that eleven may have been the number of the ten digits guided and controlled by the Brain one may thus not only remark the injunction to the Jews: "Thou shalt make curtains of goatshair to be a covering upon the tabernacle: _eleven_ curtains shalt thou make,"[662] but one may note also the probable elucidation of this Hebrew symbolism:--

Shall any gazer see with mortal eyes
Or any searcher know by mortal mind;
Veil after veil will lift, but there must be
Veil upon veil behind.[663]

Assuming that in the simplest sense the elphin eleven were the ten digits and the Brain, one may compare with this combination the ten Powers or qualities which according to the Cabala emanated from "The Most Ancient One". "He has given existence to all things. He made ten lights spring forth from His midst, lights which shone with the forms which they had borrowed from Him and which shed everywhere the light of a brilliant day. The Ancient One, the most Hidden of the hidden, is a high beacon, and we know Him only by His lights which illuminate our eyes so abundantly. His Holy Name is no other thing than these lights."[664]

According to _The Golden Legend_ the Emperor of Constantinople applied to St. Ambrose to receive the sacred mysteries, and that Ambrose was Vera or Truth is hinted by the testimony of the Emperor. "I have found a man of _truth_, my master Ambrose, and such a man ought to be a bishop." The word _bishop_, Anglo-Saxon _biscop_, supposed to mean _overseer_, is like the Greek _episcopus_, radically _op_, an _eye_.[665] Egyptian archæologists tell us that in Egypt the Coptic Land of the Great Optic, even the very games had a religious significance; whence there was probably some ethical idea behind the British "jingling match by eleven blind-folded men and one unmasked and hung with bells". This joyous and diverting _jeu_ is mentioned as part of the sports-programme at the celebrated Scouring of the White Horse: we have already noted the blind-folded Little Leaf Man, led blind Amor-like from house to house, also the _Blind_ Man who is said to have sat for _eleven_ years in the Church of St. Maur (or Amour?), and among other sports at the Scouring, eleven enters again into an account of chasing the fore wheel of a wagon down the hill slope. The trundling of a fiery wheel--which doubtless took place at the several British Trendle Hills--is a well-known feature of European solar ceremonies: the greater interest of the Scouring item is perhaps in the number of competitors: "_eleven_ on 'em started and amongst 'em a sweep-chimley and a millard [milord], and the millard tripped up the sweep-chimley and made the zoot fly a good 'un--the wheel ran pretty nigh down to the springs that time".[666]

The Jewish conception of The Most Ancient One, the most Hidden of the hidden, reappears in Jupiter Ammon, whose sobriquet of Ammon meant _the hidden one_: "Verily, Thou art a God that hidest Thyself". In England the game of _Hide and Seek_ used to be known as _Hooper's Hide_,[667] and this curious connection between Jupiter, the Hidden one, and _Hooper's Hide_ somewhat strengthens my earlier surmise that Hooper = Iupiter.

In the opinion of Sir John Evans "there can be little doubt" of the head upon the obverse of Fig. 344 being intended for Jupiter Ammon;[668] in Cornish Blind Man's Hide and Seek, the players used to shout "Vesey, vasey vum: _Buckaboo_ has come!"[669]

If as now suggested the wheel and the "spindle whorl" were alike symbols of the Eye of Heaven, it is equally probable that the amber, and many other variety of bead, was also a talismanic eyeball:[670] among grave deposits the blue bead was very popular, assumedly for the reason that blue was the colour of heaven. Large quantities of blue "whorls" were discovered by Schliemann[671] at Mykenæ, and among the many varieties of beads found in Britain one in particular is described as "of a Prussian Blue colour with three circular grooves round the circumference, filled with white paste".[672] This design of three circles reappears in Fig. 347 taken from the base of a British Incense-cup; likewise in a group of rock sculpturings (Fig. 348) found at Kirkmabreck in Kirkcudbrightshire. Mr. Ludovic Mann, who sees traces of astronomical intention in this sculpture, writes: "If the pre-historic peoples of Scotland and indeed Europe had this conception, then the Universe to their mind would consist of eleven units, namely, the nine celestial bodies already referred to, and the Central Fire and the 'Counter-Earth'. Very probably they knew also of elliptical motions. Oddly enough the cult of eleven units (which I detected some fifteen years ago) representing the universe can be discerned in the art of the late Neolithic and Bronze Ages in Scotland and over a much wider area. For example, in nearly all the cases of Scottish necklaces of beads of the Bronze Age which have survived intact, it will be found that they consist of a number of beads which is eleven or a multiple of eleven. I have, for example, a fine Bronze Age necklace from Wigtownshire consisting of 187 beads (that is of 17 × 11) and a triangular centre piece. The same curious recurrence of the number and its multiples can often be detected in the number of standing stones in a circle, in the number of stones placed in slightly converging rows found in Caithness, Sutherland, some parts of England, Wales, and in Brittany. The number eleven is occasionally involved in the Bronze Age pottery decorations, and in the patterns on certain ornaments and relics of the Bronze Age.... The Cult of eleven seems to survive in the numerous names of Allah, who was known by ninety-nine names, and hence it is invariably the case that the Mahommedan has a necklace consisting of either eleven or a multiple of eleven beads but not exceeding ninety-nine, as he is supposed to repeat one of the names for each bead which he tells."[673]

We have seen that the _rudraksha_ or eye of the god S'iva seeds are usually eleven faceted, and my surmise that the whorls of Troy were universal Eyes is further implied by the group here illustrated. According to Thomas, our British Troy Towns or Caer Troiau were originally astronomical observatories, and he derives the word _troiau_ from the verb _troi_ to _turn_, or from _tro_ signifying a _flux of time_:--[674]

By ceaseless actions all that is subsists;
Constant rotation of th' unwearied wheel
That Nature rides upon, maintains her health,
Her beauty and fertility. She dreads
An instant's pause and lives but while she moves.

The Trojan whorls are unquestionably _tyres_ or _tours_, and the notion of an eye is in some instances clearly imparted to them by radiations which resemble those of the _iris_. The wavy lines of No. 1835 and 1840 probably denote water or the spirit, in No. 1847 the "Jupiter chain" of our SOLIDO coin reappears; the astral specks on 1841 and 1844 may be connoted with the stars and planets, and in 1833 the sense of rolling or movement is clearly indicated.

Schliemann supposes that the thousands of whorls found in Troy served as offerings to the tutelary deity of the city, _i.e._, Athene: some of them have the form of a cone, or of two cones base to base, and that Troy was pre-eminently a town of the Eternal Eye is perhaps implied by the name Troie.

Fig. 351 is a ground plan of Trowdale Mote in Scotland which, situated on a high and lonely marshland within near sight of nothing but a few swelling hillocks amongst reeds and mosses and water, has been described as the "strangest, most solitary, most prehistoric looking of all our motes".[675]

It was popularly supposed that all the witches of West Cornwall used to meet at midnight on Midsummer Eve at Trewa (pronounced _Troway_) in the parish of Zennor, and around the dying fires renewed their vows to the Devil, their master. In this wild Zennor (supposedly _holy land_) district is a witch's rock which if touched nine times at midnight reputedly brought good luck.

The "Troy Town" of Welsh children is the Hopscotch of our London pavements; at one time every English village seems to have possessed its maze (or Drayton?), and that the mazes were the haunts of fairies is well known:--

... the yellow skirted fays
Fly after the night steeds
Leaving their moon-loved maze.

In _A Midsummer-Night's Dream_ Titania laments:--

The nine men's morris is filled up with mud
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are indistinguishable.

At St. Martha's Church near Guildford, facing Newlands Corner are the remains of an earthwork maze close by the churchyard, and within this maze used to be held the country sports.[676] We shall consider some extraordinarily quaint mazes and Troy Towns in a subsequent chapter, but meanwhile it may here be noted that in the Scilly Islands (which the Greeks entitled Hesperides) is a monument thus described: "Close to the edge of the cliff is a curious enclosure called Troy Town, taking its name from the Troy of ancient history; the streets of ancient Troy were so constructed that an enemy, once within the gates, could not find his way out again. The enclosure has an outer circle of white pebbles placed on the turf, with an opening at one point, supposed to represent the walls and gate of Troy. Within this there are several rows of stones; the spaces between them represent the streets. It presents quite a maze, and but few who enter can find their way out again without crossing one of the boundary lines. It is not known when or by whom it was constructed, but it has from time to time been restored by the islanders."[677]

This Troy Town is situated on _Camper_dizil Point; in the same neighbourhood is Carn _Himbra_ Point, and _Himbrian, Kymbrian_, or _Cambrian_ influences are seemingly much evident in this district, as doubtless they also were at Comberton[678] famous for its maze.

At the very centre, eye, or _San Troy_ of St. Mary's Island is situated Holy Vale, and here also are the place-names Maypole, Burrow, and Content. It has already been suggested that Bru or Burrow was originally _pure Hu_ or _pere Hu_, Hu being, as will be remembered, the traditional Leader of the Kymbri into these islands, and the first of the Three National Pillars of Britain: the chief town of St. Mary's is Hugh Town, and running through Holy Vale is what is described as a paved way (in wonderful preservation) known as the Old Roman Road, formerly supposed to be the main-way to Hugh Town. One may be allowed to question whether the Legions of Imperial Rome ever troubled to construct so fine a causeway in so insignificant an island; or if so, for what reason? The houses of Holy Vale are embowered in trees of larger growth than those elsewhere in the neighbourhood: they "complete a picture of great calm and repose," and that this Holy Vale was anciently an _abri_ is fairly self-evident apart from the interesting place-name _Burrow_, and the neighbouring Bur Point.

The Romans entitled the Scillies _Sillinæ Insulæ_: I have already suggested they were a seat of the Selli; we have met with Selene in connection with St. Levan's, and it is not improbable that the deity of _Sillinæ Insulæ_ was Selene, Helena, or Luna. The Silus stone from the ruined chapel of St. Helen's at Helenium or Land's End (Cape Cornwall) has been already noted: the most ancient building in all the _Sillinæ Insulæ_ or the Scillies is the ruined chapel on St. Helen's of which the northern aisle now measures 12 feet wide and 19 feet 6 inches long. As the Hellenes usually had ideas underlying all their measurements it is probable that the 19 feet 6 inches was primarily 19 feet, for nineteen was a highly mystic Hellenic number. Of the Hyperboreans Diodorus states: "They say, moreover, that Apollo once in nineteen years comes into the island in which space of time the stars perform their courses and return to the same points, and therefore the Greeks call the revolutions of nineteen years the Great Year". Nineteen nuns tended the sacred fire of St. Bridget, and according to some observers the inmost circle of Stonehenge consisted of nineteen "Blue Stones".[679] These nineteen Stone Hengles may be connoted with the nineteen ruined huts on the summit of Ingleborough in Yorkshire: the summit of Ingleborough is a plateau of about a mile in circuit and hereupon are "vestiges of an ancient British camp of about 15 acres inclosing traces of _nineteen_ ancient _horseshoe shaped_ huts".[680]

As the word _ingle_, meaning _fire_, is not found until 1508 the authorities are unable to interpret Ingleborough as meaning Fire hill, although without doubt it served as a Beacon: the same etymological difficulty likewise confronts them at Ingleby Cross, Inglesham, numerous Ingletons, and at Ingestre. We have seen that Inglewood was known as Englysshe Wood;[681] in Somerset is Combe English, and in the Scillies is English Island Hill: 500 yards from this English Hill is a stone circle embracing an upright stone the end of which is 18 inches square.

Eighteen courtiers were assigned to the _ange_ Oberon: the megalith Long Meg is described as a square unhewn freestone column 15 feet in circumference by 18 feet high, and there is no doubt that eighteen or twice nine possessed at one time some significance. I suspect that the double nine stood for the Twain, each of which was reckoned as nine or True: on the top of Hellingy Downs in the Scillies is a barrow covered with large stones _nine_ feet long, and built upon a mound which is surrounded by inner and outer rows of stone.[682]

On Salakee Downs there is a monolith resting on a large flat rock, on three projections situated at a distance of _eighteen_ inches from one another and each having a diameter of about 2 inches:[683] this is known as the Druid's throne, and about 5 yards to the east are two more upright rocks of similar size and shape named the Twin Sisters.[684] The Twin Sisters of Biddenden, whose name was Preston, were associated with five pieces of ground known as the Bread and Cheese Lands, in which connection it is interesting to find that near English Island Hill is Chapel _Brow_, constituting the eastern point of a deep bay known by the curious name of Bread and Cheese Cove.[685] In connection with Biddenden we connoted Pope's Hall and Bubhurst; it is thus noteworthy that near Bread and Cheese Cove is a Bab's Carn, and a large sea cavern known as Pope's Hole.

In Germany and Scandinavia the stone circles are known not as Merry Maidens, but as Adam's Dances. Close to Troy Town on St. Agnes in the Scillies are two rocks known as Adam and Eve: these are described as _nine_ feet high with a space about _nine_ inches between them: "Here, too, is the Nag's Head, which is the most curious rock to be met with on the islands; it has a remote resemblance to the head of a horse, and would seem to have been at one time an object of worship, being surrounded by a circle of stones".[686]

On the lower slopes of Hellingy are the remains of a primitive village, and the foundations of many circular huts: among these foundations have been found a considerable quantity of crude pottery, and an ancient hand-mill which the authorities assign to about 2000 B.C. We have seen that the goddesses of Celtdom were known as the _Mairæ, Matronæ, Matres_, or _Matræ_ (the mothers): further, that the Welsh for Mary is Fair, whence the assumption becomes pressing that the "Saint" Mary of the Scillies was primarily the Merry Fairy. The author of _The English Language_ points out that in Old English _merry_ meant originally no more than "agreeable, pleasing". Heaven and Jerusalem were described by old poets as "merry" places; and the word had supposedly no more than this signification in the phrase "Merry England," into which we read a more modern interpretation.[687] That the Scillies were permeated with the Fairy Faith is sufficiently obvious; at Hugh Town we find the ubiquitous Silver Street, and the neighbouring Holvear Hill was not improbably holy to Vera.

Near the Island of St. Helen's is a group of rocks marked upon the map as Golden Ball Bar; near by is an islet named Foreman. The farthest sentinel of the Scillies is an islet named the Bishop, now famous to all sea-farers for its _phare_. It is quite certain that no human Bishop would ever have selected as his residence an abode so horribly exposed, whence it is more likely that the Bishop here commemorated was the Burnebishop or Boy Bishop whose ceremonies were maintained until recent years, notably and particularly at Cambrai. In England it is curious to find the Lady-bird or Burnie Bee equated with a Bishop, yet it was so; and hence the rhyme:--

Bishop, Bishop Burnebee, tell me when my wedding will be,
Fly to the east, fly to the west,
Fly to them that I love best.

In connection with the Island of St. _Agnes_ it may be noted that _ignis_ is the Latin for _fire_, whence it is possible that the islets, Big Smith and Little Smith, Burnt Island and Monglow, all had some relation to the Fieryman, Fairy Man, or Foreman: it is also possible that the neighbouring Camperdizil Point is connected with _deiseul_, the Scotch ejaculation, and with _dazzle_. Troy Town in St. Agnes is almost environed by Smith Sound, and this curious combination of names points seemingly to some connection between the Cambers and the metal smiths.[688]

It will be remembered that Agnes was a title of the Papesse Jeanne, who was said to have come from Engelheim or _Angel's Home_: in Germany the Lady Bird used to be known as the Lady Mary's Key-bearer, and exhorted to fly to Engelland: "Insect of Mary, fly away, fly away, to Engelland. Engelland is locked, its key is broken."[689] Sometimes the invocation ran: "Gold chafer up and away to thy high storey to thy Mother Anne, who gives thee _bread and cheese_. 'Tis better than bitter death."[690]

Thanks to an uncultured and tenacious love of Phairie, the keys of rural Engelland have not yet been broken, nor happily is Engelland locked. Our history books tell us of a splendid pun[691] perpetrated by a Bishop of many centuries ago: noticing some captured English children in the market-place at Rome, he woefully exclaimed that had they been baptised then would they have been _non Angli sed angeli_. Has this episcopal pleasantry been overrated? or was the good Bishop punning unconsciously deeper than he intended?

FOOTNOTES:

[593] Gomme, Sir L., _London_, p. 74.

[594] _De bello Gallico_, v., 21.

[595] Blackie, C., _Dictionary of Place-names_, p. 21.

[596] Garnier, Col., _The Worship of the Dead_, p. 240.

[597] Thomas, J., _Brit. Antiquissima_, p. 108.

[598] The choral music of the Teutons did not create a favourable
impression on the mind of Tacitus, _vide_ his account of a
primitive Hymn of Hate: "The Germans abound with rude strains
of verse, the reciters of which, in the language of the
country, are called Bards. With this barbarous poetry they
inflame their minds with ardour in the day of action, and
prognosticate the event from the impression which it happens
to make on the minds of the soldiers, who grow terrible to
the enemy, or despair of success, as the war-song produces an
animated or a feeble sound. Nor can their manner of chanting
this savage prelude be called the tone of human organs: it is
rather a furious uproar; a wild chorus of military virtue.
The vociferation used upon these occasions is uncouth and
harsh, at intervals interrupted by the application of their
bucklers to their mouths, and by the repercussion bursting
out with redoubled force."--_Germania_, I., iii., p. 313.

[599] Blackman, Winifred S., _The Rosary in Magic and Religion_,
Folklore, xxiv., 4.

[600] Wright, E. M., _Rustic Speech and Folklore_, p. 303.

[601] _Cf._ Hazlitt, W. Carew, _Faiths and Folklore_, i., p. 314.

[602] Cockney dialect is closely akin to Kentish, and abounds in
venerable verbal relics: "The stranger enters, but he
nonetheless pays his toll; he does not leave any mark on
London, but London leaves an indelible stamp upon him. The
children of the foreigner, the children of the Yorkshireman
or Lancastrian, belong in speech neither to Yorkshire nor
Lancashire, they become more Cockney than the Cockneys; and
even the alien voices of the east end, notably less musical
than those of our own people, take on the tones of London's
ancient speech."--MacBride, Mackenzie, _London's Dialect, An
Ancient form of English Speech, with a Note on the Dialects
of the North of England, and the Midlands and Scotland_, p.
8.

[603] Bliss, J. B., _A Mound of Many Cities or Tell el Hesy
Excavated_.

[604] I was unaware of this rather corroborative evidence when I
put forward the suggestion five years ago that _Egypt_ was
radically _ypte_ or _Good Eye_.

[605] The Iberians and Jews also possessed a never-to-be-uttered
sacred Name.

[606] _Barddas_, p. 95.

[607] _Ibid._, p. 251.

[608] _Barddas_, p. 23.

[609] As also was the Bardic conception of God, summed up in the
Triad:--

"Three things which God cannot but be; whatever perfect
Goodness ought to be; whatever perfect
Goodness would desire to be; and whatever perfect
Goodness can be."

Again--

"There is nothing beautiful but what is just;
There is nothing just but _love_;
There is no love but God."

And thus it ends. Tydain, the Father of Awen, sang it, says
the Book of Sion Cent (_Barddas_, p. 219).

[610] Eckenstein, L., _Comparative Studies in Nursery Rhymes_, p.
146.

[611] Illustrated on page opposite.

[612] This name appears on maps sometimes as Salla Key, sometimes
as Salakee.

[613] Tonkin, J. C., _Lyonesse_, p. 38.

[614] Randolph (1657).

[615] Johnson, W., _Byways_, p. 185.

[616] Hazlitt, W. Carew, _Faiths and Folklore_, i., 309.

[617] Quoted from Harrison, J., _Ancient Art and Ritual_, p. 188.

[618] _Folklore_, XXV., iv., p. 426.

[619] Larwood and Hotten, _Hist. of Signboards_, p. 504.

[620] _Cf._ Borlase, W., _Cornwall_, pp. 193, 201.

[621] One may connote this ceremony with the Bardic triad: "God is
the measuring rod of all truth, all justice, and all
goodness, therefore He is a yoke on all, and all are under
it, and woe to him who shall violate it".

[622] See Fig. 331, p. 538.

[623] Quoted from _Science of Language_, Max Müller, p. 540.

[624] Sabean Litany attributed to Enoch.

[625] _G. L._, v. 185, 195.

[626] Walford E., _Greater London_, vol. ii., p. 299.

[627] Dennis G., _Cities of Etruria_.

[628] _Cornwall_, vol. i., 397; _Victoria County Histories_.

[629] _Cornwall_, vol. i., 394; _Victoria County Histories_.

[630] Blackie's _Dictionary of Place-Names_ defines Godmanham as
follows: "the holy man's dwelling, the site of an idol temple
destroyed under the preaching of Paulinus whose name it
bears," p. 98.

[631] "The year before last I went to Bodavon Mountain to take
photographs of the cromlech that used to lie there. When I
got there, however, I found the place absolutely bare, not a
vestige of the cromlech remaining. On making inquiries, a
road newly metalled was pointed out to me, and I was told
that the cromlech had been used for that purpose. This was
done despite the fact that many tons of loose stone are lying
on the mountain-side close by."--Griffith, John E., _The
Cromlechs of Anglesey and Carnarvon_, 1900.

[632] Huyshe, W., _Life of St. Columba_, p. 176.

[633] Hazlitt, W. Carew, _Faiths and Folklore_, i., 210.

[634] "The metrical historian Hardyng twice employed but without
explaining the appellation _stone Hengels_, 'which called is
the Stone Hengles certayne'. This reads like _lapides
Anglorum_ or _lapides Angelorum_."--Herbert, A., _Cyclops
Christianus_, p. 165.

[635] "Who would ween, in this worlds realm, that Hengest thought
to deceive the king who had his daughter. For there is never
any man, that men may not over-reach with treachery. They
took an appointed day, that these people should come
together with concord and with peace, in a plain that was
pleasant beside Ambresbury; the place was _Aelenge_; now
hight it Stonehenge. There Hengest the traitor, either by
word or by writ, made known to the king; that he would come
with his forces, in honour of the king; but he would not
bring in retinue but three hundred knights, the wisest men
of all that he might find. And the king should bring as many
on his side bold thanes, and who should be wisest of all
that dwelt in Britain, with their good vestments, all
without weapons, that no evil, should happen to them,
through confidence of the weapons. Thus they it spake, and
eft they it brake; for Hengest the traitor thus gan he teach
his comrades, that each should take a long saex (knife), and
lay be his shank, within his hose, where he it might hide.
When they came together, the Saxons and Britons, then quoth
Hengest, most deceitful of all knights: 'Hail be thou, lord
king, each is to thee thy subject! If ever any of thy men
hath weapon by his side, send it with friendship far from
ourselves, and be we in amity, and speak we of concord; how
we may with peace our lives live.' Thus the wicked man spake
there to the Britons. Then answered Vortiger--here he was
too unwary--'If here is any knight so wild, that hath weapon
by his side, he shall lose the hand through his own brand,
unless he soon send it hence'. Their weapons they sent away,
then had they nought in hand; knights went upward, knights
went downward, each spake with other as if he were his
brother.

"When the Britons were mingled with the Saxons, then called
Hengest of knights most treacherous: 'Take your saexes, my
good warriors, and bravely bestir you and spare ye none!'
Noble Britons were there, but they knew not of the speech,
what the Saxish men said them between. They drew out the
saexes, all aside; they smote on the right side, they smote
on the left side; before and behind they laid them to the
ground; all they slew that they came nigh; of the king's men
there fell four hundred and five, woe was the king
alive!"--Layamon, _Brut._.

[636] _Cf._ Herbert, A., _Cyclops Christianius_, p. 163.

[637] _Surnames_, p. 31.

[638] _Cf._ Hazlitt, W. Carew, _Faith and Folklore_, ii., 389.

[639] _Teutonic Mythology_, Rydberg, p. 360.

[640] _Demonology_, 177.

[641] _Cf._ Wright, T., _Essays on Archæological Subjects_, i.,
120.

[642] Davies, D., _The Ancient Celtic Church of Wales_, p. 14.

[643] _Cf._ _Sketches of Irish History_, anon., Dublin, 1844.

[644] _Cf._ Gordon, E. O., _Prehistoric London, its Mounds and
Circles_, p. 67.

[645] Borlase, _Cornwall_, p. 208.

[646] _Cf._ Bonwick, J., _Irish Druids_, p. 11.

[647] _De Bello Gallico_, VI., x., 17.

[648] Quoted by Bryant from _Appollon Argonaut_, L. 4, V. 611.

[649] _Cf._ Wilkes, Anna, _Ireland, Ur of the Chaldees_, p. 88.

[650] Borlase, _Antiquities of Cornwall_, p. 173.

[651] p. 6.

[652] _Odyssey_, XII.

[653] Johnson, W., _Byways_, p. 440.

[654] As all our _Avons_ are traced to Sanscrit _ap_, meaning
water, one may here note the Old English word _snape_,
meaning _a spring_ in arable ground.

[655] In the mediæval _Story of Asenath_, the Angel who describes
himself as "Prince of the House of God and Captain of His
Host," and was thus presumably Michael, says to Asenath;
"Look within thine _Aumbrey_, and thou shall find withal to
furnish thy table". Then she hastened thereto and found "a
store of Virgin honey, white as snow of sweetest savour". The
archangel tells Asenath that "all whom Penitence bringeth
before Him shall eat of this honey gathered by the bees of
Paradise, from the dew of the roses of Heaven, and those who
eat thereof shall never see death but shall live for
evermore."--_Aucassin and Nicolette and other Mediæval
Romances_, p. 209 (Everyman's Library).

[656] Gordon, A. O., _Prehistoric London_, p. 66.

[657] _Lost Language_, ii., 141.

[658] _Golden Legend_, iii., 117.

[659] _Cornwall_, p. 207.

[660] Hunt, J., _Popular Romances of the West of England_, p. 76.

[661] P. 20

[662] Exod. xxvi. 7.

[663] Arnold, E., _Light of Asia_.

[664] _Cf._ Abelson, J., _Jewish Mysticism_, p. 137.

[665] The Bryan of popular ballad seems to have been famed for the
casting of his glad eye:--

"Bryan he was tall and strong
Right blithsome rolled his een."
--_Percy Reliques_, i., 276.

[666] Hughes, T., _Scouring the White Horse_, p. 110.

[667] Taylor, J., _The Devil's Pulpit_, ii., 297.

[668] P. 344.

[669] Courtney, Miss M. L., _Cornish Feasts and Folklore_, p. 175.

[670] Among the Maoris potent powers were supposed to reside in the
human eye. "When a warrior slew a chief, he immediately
gouged out his eyes and swallowed them, the _atua tonga_, or
divinity, being supposed to reside in that organ; thus he not
only killed the body, but also possessed himself of the soul
of his enemy, and consequently the more chiefs he slew, the
greater did his divinity become."--Taylor, R., _Te Ika A
Maui, or New Zealand and its Inhabitants_.

[671] _Mykenæ_, p. 77.

[672] B.M., _Guide to the Early Iron Age_, p. 107.

[673] _Archaic Sculpturings_, p. 23.

[674] _Britannia Antiquissima_, p. 50.

[675] Coles, F. R., _The Motes of Kirkcudbrightshire_, p. 151.

[676] Johnson, W., _Byways_, p. 195.

[677] _Lyonesse, a Handbook for the Isles of Scilly_, p. 70.

[678] The Cambridgeshire Comberton is situated on the Bourn brook:
there is also a Great and Little Comberton underlying Bredon
Hill in the Pershore district of Worcester.

[679] The term "Bluestone" in the West of England meant _holy
stone_.

[680] Wilson, J. G., _Imperial Gazetteer_.

[681] On the tip-top of Highgate Hill is now standing an
_Englefield_ House immediately adjacent to an _Angel_ Inn.

[682] _Lyonesse_, p. 41.

[683] _Ibid._, p. 39.

[684] _Ibid._, p. 39.

[685] _Ibid._, p. 79.

[686] _Ibid._, p. 78.

[687] P. 112.

[688] Writing _not_ in connection with either Monglow or
Camperdizil Miss Gordon observes: "We may conjure up the
scene where the watery stretches reflected in molten gold the
'pillars of fire' symbolising the presence of God; we seem to
behold the reverend forms of the white clad Druids revolving
in the mystic 'Deasil' dance from East to West around the
glowing pile, and so following the course of the Sun, the
image of the Deity".--_Prehistoric London_, p. 72.

[689] Eckenstein, L., _Comp. St. Nursery Rhymes_, p. 97.

[690] P. 98.

[691] Skeat believed _pun_ meant something _punched_ out of shape.
Is it not more probably connected with the Hebrew _pun_
meaning _dubious_?