It was a surprise to find at Avebury, a lonely village a few miles farther on, relics of a pre-historic stone circle that completely dwarf the giants of Stonehenge. This great circle was about three-quarters of a mile in circumference and three hundred years ago was nearly perfect. The mighty relics were destroyed by the unsentimental vandals of the neighborhood, and it is said that most of the cottages in the village were built from these stones. Some of them were buried to clear the land of them! Barely a dozen remain of more than six hundred monoliths that stood in the circle as late as the reign of Elizabeth; and the destruction ceased only fifty years ago. The stones are ruder and less symmetrical than those of Stonehenge, but their individual bulk averages greater--mighty fragments of rock weighing from fifty to sixty tons each. The Avebury circle is supposed to have been a temple of prehistoric sun worshipers, but its crudity indicates that it is far older than Stonehenge. A short run across the downs soon brought us to Marlborough, a name more familiar as that of a dukedom than of a town. But the Duke of Marlborough lives at Blenheim, forty miles away, and has no connection with the Wiltshire town. Its vicissitudes were those of almost any of the older English towns, though it had the rare distinction of having its castle destroyed before the time of Cromwell. It has little of great antiquity, since a fire two hundred and fifty years ago totally wiped out the town that then existed. In the coaching days, it was an important point on the London and Bath road; and perhaps the motor car may bring back something of its old-time prosperity. The Ailesbury Arms, where we stopped for our belated lunch, appeared to be a most excellent hotel and is the only one I recollect which had a colored man in uniform at the door. Immediately adjoining Marlborough is Savernake Forest, on the estate of the Marquis of Ailesbury, which is said to be the only forest of any extent possessed by a subject. This park is sixteen miles in circumference, and its chief glory is a straight four-mile drive between rows of enormous beeches. This splendid avenue is not "closed to motors" (the inscription that greeted us at the entrance of so many private parks), and our car carried us soberly enough through the sylvan scene, which is diversified with many grassy glades. There are several famous trees, one of which, the King's Oak, is twenty-four feet in circumference. Savernake is pleasant and impressive in summer time, but its real beauty must be most apparent in autumn, when, as an English writer describes it, "it is a blaze of crimson and yellow--the long shadows and golden sunlight giving the scene a painted, almost too brilliant effect."