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mound of loose, detached stones (none of them of any great
size) containing an area or circus of 90 yards in diameter:
the rampart is about 5 yards high, and its external bound
comprehends about five acres. In that part which fronts the
East is an entrance about 20 yards wide; and near the centre
stands a single stone of prodigious magnitude, being upwards
of 12 feet high. Some years ago, there were four other
stones, though not so large as this which remains; of these,
two were placed like door-posts at the entrance, and two in
the amphitheatre. These smaller stones were blasted and
removed by order of a person who appears to have been at
that time the farmer of this place: one of the men employed
in the work having hanged himself, and the other turning
lunatic, has given a fair opening for vulgar superstition,
to impute those misfortunes to their sacrilege in defacing
what they suppose was formerly a place of eminent sanctity.
The origin and design of this singular structure are so
uncertain, that nothing more than mere conjecture can
possibly be adduced concerning them; it is, according to
some, a temple of the Druids, according to others it is a
fortress: It may be "the circle of the terrible Loda,
with the massy stone of his power," (so often named in those
sublime, pathetic, and unequalled poems ascribed to Ossian;)
it may, in short, be whatever learning guided by fancy can
dictate.
Among the rest, permit me to lay a conjecture before my
readers. The famous Round Table is universally acknowledged
to be the scene where the brave of other days
vindicated their knighthood by feats of arms. May not this
is some measure prove a key to this my serious structure?
Their vicinity argues for it, and nothing makes against the
idea that this is the Gymnasium where the wrestlers,
the racers, and others, not of the degree of knights,
performed their exercises; exercises not yet forgotten among
the plain, uncultivated mountaineers of this country.
That it has been no place of worship belonging to the Druids
I think very evident: we no where learn that they had either
temple or altar. They prophesied, it is said, from the
intrails of human victims laid upon stones; but they
resided, they worshipped, they taught their pupils in the
woods. Their principal seat was in the Isle of Anglisea
among the oaks *, whence they had their name; and
their chief festival was on the first day of the vernal new
moon, when they went with great solemnity to gather the
sacred misseltoe, to which they attributed many miraculous
effects.
A farther and stronger argument of Mayburgh having been
built about the same time with the Round Table, is drawn
from a very well-known piece of history. The knights of King
Arthur, the Teutonics, Hospitallers, and Templars, (who were
nearly the same,) having built Marienburgh in Prussia,
(which differs little in sound from Mayburgh, and had its
name from a large oak which stood there,) were afterwards
banished Germany; many of them then came into England, where
considerable possessions were allotted them. That these
domains were in this neighbourhood the name and privileges
of Temple-Sowerby plainly evince, as it enjoys to this day
the immunities of these knights, viz. exemption from
land-tax and all tolls in every market, and freedom from the
jurisdiction of the Bishop; the Lord thereof acting both as
Bishop and Chancellor in his own Lordship.
Before we dismiss the subject, I cannot help remarking that
the great Countess of Pembroke is totally silent respecting
Mayburgh, notwithstanding it was her own property; and Sir
Philip Sydney, whose intelligence was very great, resided
with her at Brougham Castle during the time he wrote part of
his Arcadia.
Dr. Burn and some others say, that Penrith Castle was built
of the stones which were
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