Forthys · payd · meatahyr[1]
The · year · of · ovr · Savyore
XV · hvndreth · seventyfovr.
The Sandfords ended at last, after three hundred years, in 1680.
XXII
Returning to the road from these quests, the Lowther is crossed at Lowther Bridge. Beside the river and immediately skirting the road, is the earthwork known as “King Arthur’s Round Table,” an ancient raised platform whose purpose can only be guessed at. Not King Arthur, but the Norse settlers, are held to have been the originators of it, as the stage whereon their rude displays of arms were held: in particular a duel known as “holmegang,” a species of gladiatorial combat in which the opponents were armed with knives, bound together, and then compelled to fight to the death. Such are the fearful memories of this now peaceful scene. On the opposite side of the road, within a belt of trees, is an arena ascribed to the no less tragical rites of the Druids.
KING ARTHUR’S DRINKING CUP.
King Arthur is further celebrated in a huge circular red sandstone tank standing in the yard of the “Crown” inn, adjoining. It is known locally as “King Arthur’s Drinking Cup,” and has a capacity of about eighty gallons, sufficient to quench the thirst, not merely of King Arthur, but of a megatherium. But quite apart from any wildly absurd legends, the thing is astonishing in these days of zinc cisterns. Who so painfully scooped this tank out of a solid block of stone, and when, and how long the work occupied him, are alike unknown.
EAMONT BRIDGE