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Show 156 GREAT STONES CHAP. III. lay about 9~ inches beneath the level of the surrounding ground, and its up} er surface 19 inches above the ground. A hole was also dug close to a second huge stone, which in falling had broken into two pieces; and this must have happened long ago, judging from the weathered aspect of the fractured ends. The base was buried to a depth of 10 inches, as was ascertained by driving an iron skewer horizontally into the ground beneath it. The vegetable mould forming the turf-covered sloping border ronnel the stone, on which many castings had recently been ejected, was 10 inches in thickness ; and most of this mould must have been brought up by worms from beneath its ba e. At a distance of 8 yards from the stone, the mould was only '5~ inches in thickness (with a piece of tobacco pipe at a depth of 4 inches), and this rested on broken flint and chalk which could not have easily yielded to the presl:mre or weight of the stone. A straight rod was fixed horizontally (by the aid of a spirit-level) across a third fa1len stone, which was 7 feet 9 inches long; and the contour of the projecting parts and of the adjoining ground, which was not quite level, CnAP. III. UNDERMINED BY WORMS. 157 was thus ascertained, as shown in the accompanying diagram (Fig. 7) on a scale of ! inch to a foot. The turf:·covered border sloped up to the stone on one side to a height of 4 inches, and on the opposite side to only 2& inches above the general level. A hole was dug on the eastern side, and tlle base of the stone was here found to lie at a Fig. 7. Section through one of the fallen Druidical stone:> at Stonehencre showing how much it hau sunk into the grounu. Scale ~ in~h to 1 foot. depth of 4 inches beneath the general level of the ground, and of 8 inches beneath the top of the sloping turf-covered border. Sufficient evidence has now been given showing that small objects left on the surface of the land where worms abound soon get buried, and that large stones sink slowly downwards through the same 1neans. Every |
