HADRIAN'S WALL.*
Tan power and majesty of Ancient Rome are most vividly recalled on her frontiers. The ruined cities of Algeria, like Lambessa, Timgad or Tebessa, the deserted fortresses on the edge of the Syrian desert, no less than the arch at Troves and the camps on the Rhine-Danube vellum attest the indomitable energy and efficiency of the Romans who drew a line round " the fairest part of the earth and the most civilized portion of mankind," in Gibbon's words, and held it inviolate. With- out was chaos ; within were peace, order and prosperity, We are fortunate in having, in this island, one of the noblest fragments of that wonderful system of defences which Imperial Rome raised and maintained against the barbarian. Hadrian's Wall from Tyne to Solway is an astonishing monument of Roman skill and determination, and we are glad to see that Miss Mothersole has described and illustrated it in an attractive book intended for the general reader. The Wall began • at
• Hadrian's WW1. By /ends Motbersole. London : Iona Lane 185 84 net.'
WaMend on the Tyne below Newcastle and ran for seventy- three miles across country to the Solway at Bowness. Miss Mothersole, sketch-book in hand, has tramped along its whole course and seen not only the long stretches that are well preserved but also the fragments that are hidden in private gardens or farmyards. As the great stone structure has been for centuries a convenient quarry for builders, it is remarkable that so much of it remains intact. Field-Marshal Wade, our great road-maker, laid the Carlisle highway for nineteen miles west of Newcastle on the line of the Wall, using the old foundations ; and many churches, towns and farmhouses have been built with the Roman stones. Yet in the open country, as Miss Mothersole's pleasant drawings show, you may still see the Wall stretching unbroken across hill and dale, while some of the mile-castles are well preserved and there are sub- stantial remains of the larger forts, as at Cilurnum (Chesters) and Boreovicium (Housesteads), where the wheel-ruts may still be seen on the stone paving of the gateways. The Wall was originally about twenty feet high, including the battle- ments, and had in front of it a broad and deep ditch and behind it an earthwork ; a paved road, the Stonegate, con- nected all the forts and castles. Engineers alone can rightly estimate the labour that must have been expended on this mighty work in quarrying the stone, conveying it for miles over rough ground and erecting the Wall, the forts, barracks and other buildings for the permanent garrisons. One wonders what the legionaries thought of it all, and how the Dacian sentry from the Lower Danube or the Asturian from sunny Spain solaced himself as he paced the battlements at Birdoswald or Benwell Hill, looking out over what was then a forbidding waste of moor and bog. All that we know is that the Roman discipline held these troops of many races and that for three centuries the Wall checked the incursions of the wild Caledonians. Sometimes the barbarians broke in—there are traces at Borcovicium, for instance, of the damage which they did during a temporary occupation—but the Roman troops always expelled them, until the fatal moment when the garrisons were withdrawn and Britain, in ceasing to be a Roman province, became, like Southern Ireland to-day, a prey to anarchy.
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