At Brough no Roman token visible, but the remarkable straitness of all the roads and by-lanes thereabouts: the city has been most perfectly levelled by the plough, so that the mark of ridge and furrow remains in the very road: the hedge-rows were planted since. Were it not for many distinguishing tokens, one may be apt to conclude as Floras did, _laborat annalium fides ut Veios fuisse credamus_. They say here was a church upon a place called chapel-yard, and a font was once taken up there. The old landlady at the little ale-house, which is the only house there, till Thomas Cope’s and another were lately built, says, that where her fire-place is, the cross once stood; and that the whole is fairy ground, and very lucky to live on. There have been many Roman coins dug up here, and all the way between it and Newark:[93] I bought a large brass _Faustina junior_, lately found in the corn-field over-against the ale-house: in digging too they find great foundations, for half a mile together, on each side the road, with much rusty iron, iron ore and iron cinders; so that it is probable here was an eminent Roman forge. Across the road was a vast foundation of a wall, and part still remains: out of one hole they showed me, has been dug up ten or fifteen load of stone; so that it should seem to have been a gate: the stones at the foundation are observed to be placed edgewise, and very large ones, but not of a good sort: this was the method the Romans justly thought most convenient, in this springy soil; for the springs rise here, all about, within two foot of the surface. They told me some very large copper Roman coins have been found here, and silver too, and many pots, urns, bricks, &c. they call the money Brough pennies. The earl of Stanford is lord of the manor, and all is copy-hold, probably originally in the crown. The country people have a notion that the Foss road is the oldest in England, and that it was made by William the Conqueror. This is all that I could learn of this city, which I thought no contemptible gleaning from the shipwreck of time; for _Jam seges est ubi Troja fuit_—— is true of all the stations of this whole journey, more or less; and I was glad when any part of the harvest might be applied to the gathering of antiquities. From hence the road goes extremely strait to Newark between hedge-rows, having the steeple before us as a visto: but, much to their disgrace, it is in very ill repair; nay, in some places they dig the very stone and gravel out of it to mend their streets. [Sidenote: +Newark.+]