Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 26, 1915.djvu/174

This page needs to be proofread.

1 64 Collectanea.

I could not hear of King Arthur (except once, doubtfully) in Ashdown Forest, at Robertsbridge, or Sedlescombe. A battle was fought at Gill's Lap, near Crowborough. (iQoS-)

King Arthur fought at Pevensey, and again I heard of his having been in the country between Pevensey and Lewes, but, as before, could not obtain any particulars. (1905.)

I could hear nothing of King Arthur between Three Bridges and Lewes; afterwards I heard that he had fought in the neigh- bourhood of Mount Harry. (1905-)

Alice Carter, waitress at the " Star," Alfriston, told me that the iron caldron, hanging up in the kitchen at that inn, was the one in which were the cakes which King Alfred burned ; others told me the same. (November 4, 1899.)

King Alfred fought on Wolstonbury Hill, and the ten horse- shoes which are on the Bull Hotel at Ditchling are said to have been cast by his ponies. (1905.)

Near Turner's Hill, near Three Bridges, is a place called the Withy Pits ; it is said that the Danes came forward here carry- ing branches of withies, that people thought that a wood was moving, and fled ; the Danes came on to Turner's Hill, where they were turned back, and then crawled to Crawley.

(September, 1905.)

On the hill above Alfriston is said to be the figure of a man thrown from a horse : it marks the site of a victory gained by the Saxons over the Normans. (1905.)

A " hollow cave " goes underground from Robertsbridge Abbey to Battle Abbey, and from there to Winchelsea. (1905)

Near Gill's Lap (near Crowborough), at a clump of trees called King James's Standing, King James stood and saw a hunt.

(1905-) Fires were anciently lighted on the top of Firle Beacon, Mount Caburn, and other eminences of the South Downs. They were last lighted on the day of the Queen's Jubilee, June 21st, 1887. On the top of Firle Beacon is a " round " ; the woman who told me this did not seem to be certain what this " round " was, and was inclined to think that it might have been a haunt or habitation of the giant of Firle Beacon. (1891.)

I was at Lewes on the 5th of November, 1891. In the evening