One cannot help wondering how the early inhabitants of Dartmoor spent their time. Possibly the men found plenty of work for their hands, while the ladies talked of their babies, though they could hardly talk of their clothes. Chapel teas and beer-houses were unknown, and the people may have led a wandering existence, following their cattle and goats from place to place, and merely erecting rough shelters at every pasture ground. It is said that they appeared before the Roman agents, who came to the Cassiterides, which no doubt included the Dartmoor region, to procure the precious white metal, clad in black cloaks, with tunics reaching to their feet, and girdles round their waist. A more unsuitable costume for the moor could not have been devised, but it is probable that they were then in holiday attire. They were simple, taciturn, heavily-bearded men. Of their women nothing is known, because the historians of those days did not trouble themselves about inferior details, and ladies had not then commenced to brawl in the streets for their rights. The numerous hut-circles about the moor were no doubt built by these men, utilised more as temporary sheltering-places than permanent homes, and were possibly regarded as common property. The stone avenues may have been boundaries, and the circles are more likely to be the remains of pounds than the ruins of temples. The lamp of architecture had not then been lighted in Britain, and sun-worship is by its very nature antagonistic to temples. So much is conjecture, and cannot be anything else. Light is reached when we regard the great mounds beside the rivers, and the huge stone slabs which span them; and we know that prehistoric man was a miner, and that he objected to getting his feet wet. These rivers are mere streams to-day, which any one can wade across, and they could not have been larger when the bridges were erected. We know also by the presence of these slabs of granite, and various other stone remains, that the system of the corvée must have been practised upon Dartmoor; a good custom which disappeared centuries ago as an obligation on free people, but is still retained as an obligation on prisoners in such penal establishments as Princetown. The existence of rates for the maintenance of roads is a survival of the corvée in a form of demand upon those who can afford to pay, and not a few who cannot, for the upkeep of roads which many of them do not use; the idea of the rate being that the householder pays a sum which shall exempt him from the labours of the corvée, although without being given the option of offering his labour in lieu of cash.