We missed the main road from Bath to Wells, wandering through a maze of unmarked byroads, and were able to proceed only by frequent inquiry. We did not regain the highway until just entering the town and had been a comparatively long time in going a short distance. After a few minutes' pause to admire the marvelous west front of the cathedral, with its endless array of crumbling prophets, saints and kings, weatherworn to a soft-gray blur, we were away on the highroad leading across the wold to Cheddar, famed for its stupendous cliffs, its caverns--and its cheese. The caverns and cliffs are there, but little cheese now comes from Cheddar, even though it bears the name. As we ascended the exceedingly steep and winding road we were astonished--overwhelmed. We had not expected to find natural scenery upon such an amazing scale in the heart of England--gray pinnacled cliffs rising, almost sheer, five hundred feet into the sky. Not often may British scenery be styled imposing, but the towering cliffs of Cheddar surely merit such description. In the midst of the gorge between the great cliffs there are two prehistoric caverns extending far into the earth. We entered one of them, now a mere passageway, now a spacious cavern whose domelike roof glistens with translucent stalactites. Here we pass a still, mirrorlike pool, and there a deep fissure from which comes the gurgle of a subterranean river. Altogether, there is much that is interesting and impressive. Perhaps it all seems a little gaudy and unnatural because of the advertising methods and specious claims of the owner and alleged discoverer, but none the less a visit is worth while. The museum of relics found in the cavern contains a remarkable prehistoric skull, with low, thick frontal bone and heavy square jaw, but its queerest feature is little spurlike projections of the temporal bone just above the ear. It is estimated by archaeologists that the possessor of this curious skull had lived at least forty thousand years ago and mayhap had made his dwelling-place in the Cheddar Caves. We were assured that an offer from the British Museum of five thousand pounds for the relic had been refused. The sun was low when we left Cheddar, and Taunton seemed the nearest place where we might be sure of good accommodations. We soon reached Axbridge, a gray little market town, so ancient that a hunting-lodge built by King John still stands on the market square. Near Bridgewater, a few miles farther, is the Isle of Athelney--once an island in a marsh, perhaps--where King Alfred made his last desperate stand against the Danish invaders, defeating them and finally expelling them from Britain. Not less in interest, though perhaps less important in its issues, was the Battle of Sedgemoor, fought here in 1685, when the Duke of Monmouth was disastrously defeated by the Royal Army--the last battle worthy of the name to be waged on English soil.