ider
the stones to be artificial and probably made of sand (!) on the spot.
Inigo Jones about the same time attributes the erection to the Romans.
His master, James I, having taken a philosophic interest in the
Stones, had desired him to make some pronouncement upon them. This
monarch's grandson, in his flight, is said to have stopped and essayed
to count the stones, with the usual result on the second trial. Pepys
a short time after went "single to Stonehenge, over the Plain and some
great hills even to fright us. Come thither and find them as
prodigious as any tales I ever heard of them, and worth going this
journey to see, God knows what their use was! they are hard to tell
but may yet be told."

About the middle of the eighteenth century the Druid temple legend
began to gain ground and many great men gave support to their
interpretation; it is not yet an exploded idea. Stukely, the
archaeological writer, gives a definite date--460 B.C.--as that of
their erection, and Dr. Johnson, writing to Mrs. Thrale, says:--"It
is, in my opinion, to be referred to the earliest habitations of the
island as a druidical monument of, at least, two thousand years,
probably the most ancient work of man upon the island." In the last
part of this sentence the great doctor either forgets, or shows his
ignorance of, the antiquities at Avebury. Sir Richard Hoare, at the
close of the century, is equally convinced that this explanation is
the right one. Other theories current about this time were--that it
was a monument to four hundred British princes slain by Hengist (472);
the grave of Queen Boadicea; or a Phoenician temple; even a Danish
origin was ascribed to Stonehenge. Perhaps the most curious fact
connected with the literary history of Stonehenge is that it is not
mentioned in the Roman itineraries or by Bede or any other Saxon
writer.

In 1824 the following interesting article by H. Wansey appeared in the
_Gentleman's Magazine_.

"In my early days I frequently visited Stonehenge to make
observations at sunrise as well as by starlight. I noticed that the
lower edge of the impost of the outer circle forms a level
horizontal line in the heavens, equi-distant from the earth, to the
person standing near the centre of the building, about 15 degrees
above the horizon on all sides.

"Stonehenge stands on rather sloping ground; the uprights of the
outer circle are nearly a foot taller on the lower ground or
western sid