confessedly the figment of an astronomer's mind.
But in the
contest of clocks against sun-dials the latter were always hampered
by the imperative condition, that the sun should shine; a condition
never fulfilled in the night-time, and in England too rarely in the
day-time. So the clocks ultimately won the victory, and the sun.
dials, whose silent voices had so long preached "time's thievish
progress," fell into disuse and neglect, except when maintained or
renovated to adorn a terrace or a wall, or reconstructed according
to the fancy of some enthusiast in sciography.

Whether or not the excavations in the dial now before us were meant to be symbolical, or the whole arrangement to convey an allegory, I will leave others to determine.

Notes on Encaustic Tiles at Hentesbury House.

By HAROLD BRAKSPEAR, A.R.I.B.A.

HE accompanying plates illustrate the encaustic tiles, now preserved at Heytesbury House, which were exhibited in the dining-room during the Society's visit to that place in 1893. Lord Heytesbury can give nothing further of their history than that they were taken up from the floor of the boot-hole (of the house) by order of his grandfather. A further number were also found, but, being broken, were unfortunately thrown away.

It will be seen that the armorial devices are mostly of the

1 The average daily duration of sunshine in England is only three and a quarter hours. Arago tells us of an ingenious device in the twelfth century in the Abbey of Cluny to reckon the canonical times for nocturns and lauds. The time of the recital of certain psalms was calculated in the day by the sun-dial, and the repetition of these at night by relays of wakeful monks furnished a measure of time.

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Hungerford family. The late Canon Jackson1 states, that Walter, Lord Hungerford, the High Treasurer, seems to have been the first of his family to use as a badge the garb between two sickles; on the seal of one of his earlier deeds is a talbot's head as badge, similar to the crest on the monument of his father, Sir Thomas, in the chapel of Farleigh Castle.

According to Sir R. C. Hoare, the Dean's register contains a notice of the foundation of a small chantry in the Church at Heytesbury, by Walter, Lord Hungerford, who presented a chaplain to it on May 15th, 1421. Later references are made to two chantries said, to be on the south side of the Church, one belonging to the Hungerfords at the altar of St. Mary; the other founded by William Mounte at the altar of St. Katharine, supposed to have been in the south transept.

In 1438 an inquisition was held at the instance of Walter, Lord Hungerford, respecting the chantry of St. Mary, when it was found that the right of patronage was in the said Lord Hungerford. There was a house, seven acres of arable, three acres of mead and corn, and pasture for one hundred sheep; the whole yearly value being 40s. The Bishop, in 1442 gave license for uniting to the said chantry the chantries of St. Edmund in Calne Church, and Upton Scudamore, also the Free Chapel of Corton, in Hilmarton.5 Across the north arch of the tower is a fine fifteenth century stone screen bearing devices of the Hungerfords, and within the north transept are some remains of an altar-tomb to one of that family of late Gothic work, about the time of Henry VIII. Other parts of the same monument that were found here, were removed when the Church was restored, to Farleigh Castle, and are preserved in the chapel there.

There is every reason to suppose the tiles were from the flooring

Farleigh Guide, p. 21, note.