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 the 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 earth brought up by insects, and some accumulation of dust, much fine earth will have been washed over the ruins from the upper parts of the field, since it has been under cultivation; and from over the ruins to the lower parts of the slope; the present thickness of the mould being the resultant of these several agencies.
I may here append a modern instance of the sinking of a pavement, communicated to me in 1871 by Mr. Ramsay, Director of the Geological Survey of England. A passage without a roof, 7 feet in length by 3 feet 2 inches in width, led from his house into the garden, and was paved with slabs of Portland stone. Several of these slabs were 16 inches square, others larger, and some a little smaller. This pavement had subsided about 3 inches along the middle of the passage, and two inches on each side, as could be seen by the lines of cement by which the slabs had been originally joined to the walls. The pavement had thus become slightly concave along the middle; but there was no subsidence at the end close to the house. Mr. Ramsay could not account for this sinking, until he observed that castings of black mould were frequently ejected along the lines of junction between the slabs; and these castings were regularly swept away. The several lines of junction, including those with the lateral walls, were altogether 39 feet 2 inches in length. The pavement did not present the appearance of ever having been renewed, and the house was believed to have been built about eighty-seven years ago. Considering all these circumstances, Mr. Ramsay does not doubt that the earth brought up by the worms since the pavement was first laid down, or rather since the decay of the mortar allowed the worms to burrow through it, and therefore within a much shorter time than the eighty-seven years, has sufficed to cause the sinking of the pavement to the above amount, except close to the house, where the ground beneath would have been kept nearly dry.
Beaulieu Abbey, Hampshire.--This abbey was destroyed by Henry VIII., and there now remains only a portion of the southern aisle- wall. It is believed that the king had most of the stones carried away for building a castle; and it is certain that they have been removed. The positions of the nave and transepts were ascertained not long ago by the foundations having been found; and the place is now marked by stones let into the ground. Where the abbey formerly stood, there now extends a smooth grass-covered surface, which resembles in all respects the rest of the field. The guardian, a very old man, said the surface had never been levelled in his time. In the year 1853, the Duke of Buccleuch had three holes dug in the turf within a few yards of one another, at the western end of the nave; and the old tesselated pavement of the abbey was thus discovered. These holes were afterwards surrounded by brickwork, and protected by trap-doors, so that the pavement might be readily inspected and preserved. When my son William examined the place on January 5, 1872, he found that the pavement in the three holes lay at depths of 6.75, 10 and 11.5 inches beneath the surrounding turf- covered surface. The old guardian asserted that he was often forced to remove worm-castings from the pavement; and that he had done so about six months before. My son collected all from one of the holes, the area of which was 5.32 square feet, and they weighed 7.97 ounces. Assuming that this amount had accumulated in six months, the accumulation during a year on a square yard would be 1.68 pounds, which, though a large amount, is very small compared with what, as we have seen, is often ejected on fields and commons. When I visited the abbey on June 22, 1877, the old man said that he had cleared out the holes about a month before, but a good many castings had since been ejected. I suspect that he imagined that he swept the pavements oftener than he really did, for the conditions were in several respects very unfavourable for the accumulation of even a moderate amount of castings. The tiles are rather large, viz., about 5.5 inches square, and the mortar between them was in most places sound, so that the worms were able to bring up earth from below only at certain points.