Mr. Fergusson’s well-known work, “Rude Stone Monuments,” contains much interesting information on the subjects of which he treats, and the facts which he adduces we may presume to be facts collected with care. But this proves nothing as to the truth of the inferences which he deduces from his premises. The observing faculty and the faculty for drawing correct conclusions do not always meet in the same individual, as was notably the case in the late talented Charles Darwin with respect to his physical evolution theory. Fergusson confidently maintains, in the work to which I refer, that “Stonehenge was erected as a monument to the memory of the British chiefs treacherously slain by Hengist.” He supposes that its building commenced about A.D. 466, and may have been completed about A.D. 470. And on what authority does he chiefly rely historically for this theory? On the mediæval historian Geoffrey of Monmouth, who wrote about A.D. 1140. But what does he himself say of the credibility of this writer? To quote his own words: “he was a fabulist of the most exuberant imagination” (p. 106), and again he says of him (p. 88), “he is a frail reed to rely upon”; and yet, strange to say, we find him building much on the uncorroborated statement of Geoffrey that Stonehenge was erected in memory of the slaughter of certain British chiefs. But no less weak and inconclusive is his reasoning when he brings his reader within the area of Stonehenge. He points attention to the fact that Sir R. C. Hoare had stated in his “Ancient Wilts,” I. p. 150:—“We have found in digging (within the circle) several fragments of Roman as well as coarse British pottery, part of the head and horns of deer and other animals, and a large barbed arrow-head of iron”; and he also mentions that Mr. Cunnington at an earlier date had discovered within the area some Roman pottery. {4} From this Mr. Fergusson infers that “the building must have been erected after the Romans had settled in this island.” But what does the fact, assuming it to be a fact, that Roman pottery was found at Stonehenge, prove? Not that the Romans, or their successors, were the builders, but simply what no one will question, that the Romans during their stay in Britain, occupied this part of the country, and visited Stonehenge. He omits in his argument, it should be observed, to take any notice of the fact that “ancient British pottery” was found at the same time with Roman within the temple. Does not such an omission detract much from the fairness and force of his reasoning? Moreover we find that Sir R. C. Hoare in his “Ancient Wilts” repeatedly mentions that in digging within what were undoubtedly ancient British camps in South Wilts, he met with Roman pottery as well as British. What does this indicate? Simply that while these earthworks had been originally constructed by our Celtic forefathers they were afterwards occupied, and in many instances re-formed, by the Romans. It indicates