Gents Mag 1868 part 1 p.644

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	Gentleman's Magazine 1868 part 1 p.644 Moat of Urr, and the vitrified forts of Aberlemmo, are good examples of early Scotch remains. Wales, for obvious reasons is not so prolific in this particular class of antiquities, but she can show a goodly store of cromlechs, meinhirions, and Celtic forts. And, by the way, why is it that cromlechs, both in Wales and Ireland, are almost always placed where they overlook the sea - or, at all events, a large body of water? The fact is too persistent to be accidental, and it is one worth notice. The Welsh marches too are made interesting by Offa's Dyke, while in all parts of the country Roman remains abound. There is plenty of material for a Roman handbook to Britain. They were the great road-makers, wall-builders, and miners of their day. Their camps are scattered all over the land, although there are very few so perfect as those of Ardoch, In Perthshire, and Lanchester, in Durham. Their roads, such as the Watling Street, Ikenield Street, and the Fosse-way, were so well engineered that they are, in many cases, identifical with our modern turnpike-roads; and as for mines, both gold and iron, traces of Roman ocupation abound in Wales and the Forest of Dean. Heaps of Roman slag and cinders attest the diligence with which they smelted the iron for the use of the armourers' forges at Aquae Sulis or Bath; while the neighbourhood of Gogofau gold mines, in Carmarthenshire, abounds with Roman names and associations. But the greatest interest is undoubtedly centred in the excavations at Wroxeter (Uriconium), the pavements and treasures found at Caerleon, where the second Augustan legion so long lay in garrison; and in more limited detail, in the Roman villas exhumed at Stowell Park, in Gloucestershire, or at Bognor in Sussex. Even within the last month, a temple to Minerva has been discovered underneath the White Hart inn, at Bath, while fresh additions to our Roman antiquarian knowledge are being made daily in different parts of the country. It is, however, when we come down to later times that we find how replete the country is with historical and architectural remains, and how difficult it is for the student of mediaeval buildings to deal with the subject in detail, from its great extent. Of Saxon churches there are very few. Those in best preservation are Earl's Barton in Northamptonshire, and Worth in Sussex; although we ought not to omit mentioning the exquisite double aisles in St. John's, Chester. But from Saxon times downwards, the ecclesiologist will find work in plenty in every county in England. A single cathedral (say Canterbury), is in itself an epitome of Gothic architecture; Durham, perhaps, being the most original and consistent of all our cathedrals and abbeys. Amidst such a glorious collection of churches and monastic remains, - such as Fountains, Melrose, Furness, and Tintern, - it is impossible even to enumerate those which are worth attention, and we can only mention what seems the most striking point in the mediaeval architecture of the British Isles, and that is, the variations in point of time between England, Ireland, and Scotland. Ireland can show numbers of churches possessing mouldings and decorations usually thought to be of Norman character, but which are really of a date anterior to the 11th century. Rahin, Killeshin, Cashel, and Freshford churches, are examples of this ornamentation, which, Norman in style, is yet ante-Norman in date. Scotland, on the other hand, has kept her architectural features long
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