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Show 190 BURIAL OF THE REMAINS CrrAP. IV. beneath the floor and walls, which it is prob· able were formerly as numerous as they now are, had not collapsed in the course of time in the manner formerly explained, the underlying earth would have been riddled with passages like a sponge ; and as this was 110t the case, we may feel sure that they have collapsed. The inevitable result of Huch collapsing during successive centuries, will have been the slow subsidence of the floor and of the walls, and their burial beneath the accumulated worm-castings. The subsidence of a floor, whilst it still remains nearly horizontal, may at first appear improbable ; but the case presents no more real difficulty than that of loose o~jects strewed on the surface of a field, which, as we have seen, become buried several inches beneath the surface in the course of a few years, though still forming a horizontal layer parallel to the surface. The burial of the paved and level path on my lawn, which took place under my own observation, is a11 analogous case. Even those parts of the concrete floor which the worms could not penetrate would almost certainly have been undermined, and would have sunk, like the gren1~ CIIAP. IV. OF ANCIEN'l' BUILDINGS. 191 stones at Leith Hill Place and Stonehenge, for the soil would have been damp beneath them. But the rat~::. of sinking of the different parts woulJ not have been quite equal, and the floor was not quite level. The foundations of the boundary walls lie, as shown in the section, at a very small depth beneath the surface; they would therefore have tended to subside at nearly the same rate as the floor. But this would not have occurred if the foundations had been deep, as in the case of some other Roman ruins presently to be described. Finally, we may infer that a large part of the fine vegetable 'mould, which covered the floor and the broken-down walls of this villa in some places to a thickness of 16 inches' was brought up from below by worms. From' facts hereafter to be given there can be no doubt that some of the finest earth thus brought up will have been washed down tho sloping surface of the field during every heavy shower of rain. If this had not occurred a greater amount of mould would have accumulated over the ruins than that now present. But beside the castings of worms and some |