keeping his rivulet within its banks: and the carts and waggons used very often to make use of the causeway, which is the reason why large stones were placed there by the corporation to keep them off.

In the oldest accounts I have seen of the expenditure of the Borough fund in 1598 when William Gale was Bailiff of Chippenham, money was paid for pitching the causeway and "pitching the pyke." The pyke I presume to have been a turnstile.

There is also mention of a Hermitage on the causeway, in very old times. A public causeway, seems, at first hearing, rather an odd place for the residence of a hermit: as one generally understands by that name, a peculiar kind of individual, whose taste led him to live in a cave or a cell, away among the hills or woods, eating roots and berries, and drinking of the clear spring: a very primitive and simple mode of life, which might suit some people better than others. We often find in old researches mention of Hermits, men or women. If men, they were called sometimes Anchorites: if women, Anchoritesses. These are words of Greek origin, signifying men or women who lived apart from society. But these men hermits, though they lived alone, did not always live out of society. They lived in some small house, with a little chapel annexed, very often upon bridges in the middle of towns or cities: very often in the outskirts of towns, on some road-side, where everybody must pass by in coming into the town, and where the hermit contrived to way-lay them, and take a little toll. But I must say for him that he did not pocket the said toll for any selfish or private purpose of his own. He received it as a voluntary offering, and applied it to some useful or charitable object. Anchorites were actually licensed; and by the Bishop of the Diocese. Two of these rather curious old licenses are preserved, and in print: one was for a hermit at Fisherton, close to Salisbury, and another on Maidenhead Bridge in Berks. In both these cases, the person who applied for the license to live the life of a hermit, made what is called his profession, in a deed regularly drawn up, in solemn form. The substance of the latter is as follows:-"In the name of God, Amen. I, Richard Ludlow, before God and you my Lord Bishop

of Salisbury, and in presence of all these worshipful men here being, offer up my profession of hermit under this form that I, Richard, will be obedient to Holy Church: that I will lead my life to my life's end, in sobriety and chastity: will avoid all open spectacles, taverns, and other such places: that I will every day hear mass, and say every day certain Paternosters and Aves: that I will fast every Friday, the vigils of Pentecost and All Hallows, on bread and water. And the goods that I may get by free gift of Christian people, or by bequest, or testament, or by any reasonable and true way,-reserving only necessaries to my sustenance, as in meat, drink, clothing, and fuel, I shall truly, without deceit lay out upon reparation and amendyng of the bridge and of the common way belonging to ye same town of Maidenhead." It therefore seems not improbable, that the hermit on the Causeway at Chippenham, may have been neither more nor less than a receiver of voluntary offerings from the passers by, towards the mending of it, and of the roads.

I have certainly seen, in out-of-the-way places, some very miserable hovels, for the residence of modern collectors of tolls, on the public roads; and some very rough anchorites, and anchoritesses too, come out to receive the 41d. And I have also often bad to wait in a dark night under pelting rain, for the said anchorite, or anchoritess, to turn out, light a lantern, and grope their way out, half asleep, to unlock the gate. Under such circumstances, it is perhaps lucky for the road-repairing, that the payment is no longer voluntary for if it were, I am sure it would not be given at all: the hermit being generally very cross and impatient, and the travellers still more so. But, as the voluntary system is said by some people to be more successful than the compulsory, it is to be hoped that it was successful on the Chippenham Causeway in ancient times; and that the public roads and paths were well kept. But it is doubtful. For all the land, out of Chippenham, reaching nearly to Calne, was forest; and in old forests, roads were not first-rate. Chippenham, or Pewsham Forest, (they were mixed together) began immediately outside the present town. The bounds of that forest were these.

Beginning at Lacock Bridge, the forest boundary was the River Avon, all the way past Chippenham, round by Monkton, to where the little stream called the Marden falls into the Avon. The bound then went along the little stream Marden past Stanley Abbey, through Studley, to the park paling of Bowood. It then (as I believe) skirted Bowood Park, all the way to a point somewhere about "The George" at Sandy Lane. Then it struck off along an old road towards Lacock, and so back to Lacock Bridge.

Bowood at that time was also all forest: so that as in the opposite direction beyond Lacock, Melksham Forest joined on to that of Chippenham, the King had a considerable run for chasing the deer, all the way, one may say, from Calne to Melksham. This does not perhaps represent a very extensive hunting country, according to present notions: but the manner of hunting was different in former days. In parks, chases and forests, the deer were generally enclosed with a fence-work of wood or netting, and could only run to and fro, within a certain space for people hunted with bows and cross bows, and shot at the game over and over again. The King and his company would take up a station; and the deer were driven by hounds and men backwards and forwards, so as to give his Majesty the chance of another shot if the first missed.

Such in very old times was the state of the country on that side the town-all hunting ground belonging to the Crown. The King's villa stood somewhere a little above the Angel Inn, in High Street. Town, originally, there was none, except perhaps some few houses and cottages, necessary near the King's lodging. By degrees, as the Crown parted with forest rights, the few houses and cottages increased and became a small town. The King's favour made it a Borough, with privileges, markets and fairs.

In very ancient chronicles, we read that in the stormy period before the Conquest, when the Danes invaded England and tried to oust its Anglo-Saxon owners, in the time of King Alfred, the Danish army once took up its winter quarters at Chippenham. Now they would not have done so unless Chippenham had been a fair military position, safe against surprize. And such,

considering the mode of warfare and the want of artillery in those times, it probably was. The river winds round two sides of the town: so that when there was no bridge, it was, so far, naturally protected. An earthwork thrown across from water to water, on the side facing Derry Hill would complete the defence.

Names.

A word or two about these. There is a little street in Chippenham called "Ambry:" and the same name also is, or used to be, found close to Westminster Abbey. There, it is said to be a corruption from "Almonry," the place at which in ancient times the monks of that Abbey made their distribution of alms. Here, the name seems rather to be a corruption of " Ave Mary." Loudon has a Paternoster Row, and very near it an Are Mary Lane, both of ecclesiastical origin. "Ave Mary," pronounced quick and short would soon slide into Ambry.

I believe there is also a thoroughfare here which rejoices in the name of Rotten Row, which I mention not for its own merits, but rather on account of its celebrated namesake in Hyde Park. It is a very strange thing, that for so fashionable an equestrian promenade, one, which in the height of the London season presents such a spectacle as perhaps cannot be found elsewhere in the whole world, so uninviting a name should be retained. There has been a good deal of discussion in "Notes and Queries," 1 and publications of that sort, as to the origin of the name: but some of the explanations given are very far-fetched and unlikely. It is not an uncommon name. There is one in Glasgow, one in Bury St. Edmunds, and there are several more in country places. A simple account of the matter would seem to be, that the name was originally given, merely from what it (rather coarsely) expresses, viz. the softness of the ground, as distinguished from streets that were pitched or paved, or macadamized.

As to the names of places and parishes in the neighbourhood, one great rule for finding out their meaning is easy enough. In Wiltshire, almost all the names of places, towns and villages, 1 See Notes and Queries, third series, vol. ix., p. 361.

are originally and substantially Anglo-Saxon: and were naturally taken from some local peculiarity. Chippenham means "Markettown;" Langley, the "long lea," or "long pasture; " Stanton, the stony hamlet;" Dreicote, "Three Cotes" or "habitations;" Sutton and Norton are "South town" and "North town." This accounts for a great many names.

Another great batch of names ending in ton, is also easily accounted for. Ton or Town in Saxon, did not mean what a town means now-but it meant simply this. When the whole country was open and not appropriated by enclosure and boundary, the Saxon settler came (as the English settler now goes to Australia and New Zealand), bought his territory of 1000 acres or whatever it might be; and marked off his estate by some enclosure. Town is Saxon for enclosure. It happened that a vast number of family names among the Saxons, ended in "ing;" and just as now an English settler in Australia, gives his own or some other family name to his enclosed settlement, and calls it Grahams-town Knox-ville, Harris-burg, or the like, so it was in old times. Atheling called his place Atheling-town: we corrupt it to Alling-ton. Grithling called his estate Grithling-town, but we pronounce it Grittleton. Locking-town has become LuckingtonNetling-town is Nettleton. Badming-town is Badminton. Tithering-town is Titherton.

There are also about here, many parishes with double names. These make a third sort. In this case, the second of the two names is, generally speaking, the name of the Norman family. When the Norman gentlemen did us the honour to come over and become owners of our old Saxon places, it became a fashion with the Normans to tack their family name on to the old original Saxon name. For example, we have in Wiltshire several Stantons. One is distinguished as Stanton St. Quintin, another as Stanton Fitzwarren. St. Quintin and Fitzwarren were the Norman owners. Compton Basset and Compton Chamberlayne. Basset and Chamberlayne were family names. Sutton Benger, Draycote Cerne, Langley Burrell, Yatton Keynell, Fisherton Lucas, Fisherton Kelloways, Littleton Drew, and Leigh Delamere. In all these cases also the