The aspect of the country in the immediate vicinity of the heights of Sewingshields is dreary enough, but the elevation enables the eye to revel in the fertility and beauty of the distant landscape. Hexham is distinctly discernible from the farm-house. On the flats to the north of the crags, there formerly stood the border fortress, Sewingshields castle.[96] It was at one time the property of the late Ralph Spearman, esq., the Monkbarns of THE ANTIQUARY. [Sidenote: MURAL TRADITIONS.] A situation so remote from the crowded haunts of men is favourable to the preservation of legendary lore. It occurred to me that here, if anywhere, I might ascertain the kind of ideas which the rude forefathers of the mural region entertained respecting the Wall and its builders. Although on the Antonine Wall all tradition of the Romans has been lost, this has certainly not been the case here; the recollection of them is still distinctly preserved, and some stories of them are told, which, though in several respects resembling written history, are not derived from this source. For the following scraps of traditional information, I am chiefly indebted to the master of Grindon school, in the immediate neighbourhood of Sewingshields, who says he has often heard them repeated. Though he denominates them ‘absurd,’ the learned in mediæval legends will probably think them worth preserving. The Romans are said to have been remarkably lazy, so much so, that in the hot weather of summer, having almost nothing to do, they lay basking in the sun, on the south side of the Wall, almost in a state of torpor. The Scots were in the habit of watching their opportunity, and, throwing hooks, with lines attached to them, over the Wall, caught the poor Romans by their clothes or flesh, and by this means, dragging them to the other side, made them prisoners. An old man in this neighbourhood told me, that he had often heard people say, that the Romans had remarkably broad feet, with still broader shoes, and that, when it rained, they lay on their backs, and holding up their feet in a perpendicular direction, protected, by this means, their persons from the weather.—This legend, under various modifications, seems to have been widely diffused in the middle ages. Sir John Maundevile, describing ‘Ethiope,’ says—‘In that contree, ben folk that han but o foot; and thei gon so fast, that it is marvaylle; and the foot is so large, that it schadewethe all the body azen the sonne, whan they wole lye and reste hem.’ Precisely similar to this is Pliny’s account—'Item hominum genus, qui Monoscelli vocarentur, singulis cruribus, miræ pernicitatis ad saltum: eosdemque Sciopodas vocari, quod in majori æstu, humi jacentes resupini, umbra se pedum protegant.'[97]