them. When my sons Francis and Horace visited these ruins, he
accompanied them, and added his notes to theirs.
Mr. Joyce estimates that the town was inhabited by the Romans for about
three centuries; and no doubt much matter must have accumulated within
the walls during this long period. It appears to have been destroyed by
fire, and most of the stones used in the buildings have since been
carried away. These circumstances are unfavourable for ascertaining the
part which worms have played in the burial of the ruins; but as careful
sections of the rubbish overlying an ancient town have seldom or never
before been made in England, I will give copies of the most
characteristic portions of some of those made by Mr. Joyce. They are of
too great length to be here introduced entire.
An east and west section, 30 ft. in length, was made across a room in the
Basilica, now called the Hall of the Merchants (Fig. 9). The hard
concrete floor, still covered here and there with tesser , was found at 3
ft. beneath the surface of the field, which was here level. On the floor
there were two large piles of charred wood, one alone of which is shown
in the part of the section here given. This pile was covered by a thin
white layer of decayed stucco or plaster, above which was a mass,
presenting a singularly disturbed appearance, of broken tiles, mortar,
rubbish and fine gravel, together 27 inches in thickness. Mr. Joyce
believes that the gravel was used in making the mortar or concrete, which
has since decayed, some of the lime probably having been dissolved. The
disturbed state of the rubbish may have been due to its having been
searched for building stones. This bed was capped by fine vegetable
mould, 9 inches in thickness. From these facts we may conclude that the
Hall was burnt down, and that much rubbish fell on the floor, through and
from which the worms slowly brought up the mould, now forming the surface
of the level field.
[Picture: Fig. 7: Section through one of the fallen Druidical stones at
Stonehenge. Fig. 9: Section within a room in the Basilica at Silchester]
A section across the middle of another hall in the Basilica, 32 feet 6
inches in length, called the rarium, is shown in Fig. 10. It appears
that we have here evidence of two fires, separated by an interval of
time, during which the 6 inches of mortar and concrete with broken
tiles was accumulated. Beneath one of the layers of charred wood, a
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