was captured by the soldiers of the Seventh Legion, who, throwing up a mound against it, advanced, holding their shields over their heads in the military formation known as "the tortoise," and drove out the defenders at the sword's point. This, the last place to hold out, is, despite the eighteen and a half centuries that have passed, still to be seen in Bourne Park, on the summit of Bridge Hill, and is familiarly known in the neighbourhood as "Old England's Hole." "Never forget," the old countryfolk have been wont to impress their children--"never forget that this is Old England's Hole, and that on this spot a last stand for freedom was made by your British forefathers." Everyone in the neighbourhood knows Old England's Hole. It is seen beside the road, on the right hand, just where the cutting through the crest of the hill, made in 1829, to ease the pull-up for the coach-horses, begins. At that same time the course of the road was very slightly diverted, and, instead of actually impinging upon this ancient historic landmark, as before, was made to run a few feet away. Now the spot is seen across the fence of the park, the old course of the road still traceable beside it, as a slightly depressed grassy track, plentifully dotted with thistles. The stronghold consists of a crater-like hollow, encircled by earthen banks, still high and steep. A great number of ash-trees and thorns, some very old, gnarled, and decayed, grow on these banks, and cast a dense shade upon the interior. [Illustration: THE VALE OF BARHAM.] Barham Downs, stretching for three miles, windswept and bare, above the valley of the Lesser Stour, form a tract of country that must needs appeal strongly to the imaginative man. Only the bunkers and other recent impudent interferences of some local golf club have ever disturbed the ancient lines of Roman entrenchments. Barham Downs are, of course, the "Tappington Moor," of that terrible legend, the "Hand of Glory," which opens the collection of the _Ingoldsby Legends_ in many editions: On the lone bleak moor, At the midnight hour, Beneath the Gallows Tree, Hand in hand The Murderers stand, By one, by two, by three! And the Moon that night With a grey, cold light, Each baleful object tips; One half of her form Is seen through the storm, The other half's hid in Eclipse! And the cold Wind howls, And the Thunder growls, And the Lightning is broad and bright; And altogether It's very bad weather, And an unpleasant sort of a night! Barham village, a very different place, lies below, snugly embosomed amid the rich trees of the Stour valley, sheltered and warm. From this point its tall, tapering, shingled spire peeps out from among the massed trees, and a branch road leads directly down to it and to that park and mansion of Barham Court which, had his ancestors of remote times done their duty by posterity, the author of the _Ingoldsby Legends_ firmly believed would have been his.