The strange breath that filled these mysterious vaults had neither coldness nor moisture; a dry, fragrant dust arose from the noiseless foot that trod their bark-strewn floor; the aisles might have been tombs, the fallen trees, enormous mummies; the silence, the solitude of the forgotten past.

In the south, or Trinity, aisle is the Etricke tomb; here lies a recorder of Poole, the same who committed to prison, after his capture on one of the wild heaths near Ringwood, that one-time hope of protestant England, the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth.

The central aisle is one hundred and thirty-two feet in altitude,only surpassed by that of Beauvais, which is fourteen feet higher.

The side aisles are stalls for horses and cattle, and the centre is a remise for carriages and the public diligences which run to this inn!

The aisles are Perp., and the one on the S. curiously encloses the clerestory.

Near the church there once existed a Benedictine nunnery (said to have been founded before 1212); and what is now the S. aisle was formerly the nuns' chapel, and it still retains an early doorway and a few other vestiges of antiquity.

Avebury Church, just without the rampart, was originally a Saxon building, its aisles being Norman additions.