Roughly contemporary with the typical round barrows are those mysterious remains in the great central waste, to which allusion has already been made. Just as false systems of astrology were elaborated before the dawn of clear scientific knowledge, so during the eighteenth century a complete hagiology was constructed respecting these remains, which has become untenable in view of more rigorous historical, philological, and anthropological investigation. In other words, the accepted interpretation of these moorland wonders connected them more or less definitely with Druidism. The prism of imagination presented those hierarchs in crimson hues. If their functions included inhuman sacrifices, they themselves were far from being deficient in dignity. What says Southey in _Caradoc_? Within the stones of federation there On the green turf, and under the blue sky, A noble band—the bards of Britain—stood, Their heads in rev’rence bow’d, and bare of foot, A deathless brotherhood. But whether as priests or mere medicine men, the existence of Druids in Devon has yet to be proved. Drewsteignton derives its initial syllable, not from them, but from Drogo; Wistman’s Wood comes, not from _wissen_, but is more probably _uisg-maen-coed_ disguised in modern garb. And, as for those basins on the summits of the Dartmoor tors, they are purely natural. So the whole delightful edifice which Polwhele was at such pains to build up, and which Mrs. Bray described to the sympathetic Southey, topples down, or, rather, vanishes into thin air, leaving not a wrack behind. While the Druids, both locally and generally, belong rather to the region of myth than of solid history, the Romans are an indisputable fact in both senses. Still, their advent in the West Country is not free from obscurity. One thing seems fairly certain, namely, that they did not establish themselves in Devonshire by their usual method of conquest. Exeter, however, was a thoroughly Roman city, and traces of the Imperial race are to be found in local names, such as Chester Moor, near North Lew, and in the ruins of Roman villas, as at Seaton and Hartland. The siege of Exeter by Vespasian is one of those fictitious events which, by dint of constant reiteration, work themselves into the brain as substantial verities. The place that Vespasian attacked was not Exeter, but Pensaulcoit (Penselwood), on the borders of Somerset and Wilts. Probably the Romans were content with a protectorate, under which the Britons were suffered to retain their nationality and their native princes.