The range of downs is called by various names, such as High Down, Afton Down, Shalcomb Down, Mottistone Down, Brixton Down, Apes Down, Bowcombe Down, Gallibury Down, Rowborough Down, Lemerston Down, Gansons Down, Gatcombe Down, Chillerton Down, Mount Joy, St. George's Down, Arreton Down, Messly Down, Ashey Down, Brading Down, and Bembridge Down. All or any of these afford fine walks with sweeping views on a clear still day, but on a windy day they are best avoided, as the short slippery grass surface slopes steeply down to tremendous cliffs, and there is more than one record of an unfortunate individual taken unawares. As might be supposed, the island is celebrated among golfers, and there are excellent links, some of them upon the Downs, and the game claims the attendance of its devotees from Bembridge to the Needles.
The chines, or ravines, are another feature of the scenery found in great variety; the best known of these chines is that at Shanklin. This is full of luxuriant verdure and overgrown with a tangle of trees and shrubs, and has been formed by the action of water hollowing for itself a way into the cliff, and eating back and back. It seems almost incredible to believe the streams now seen can have been the agency for these deep cuttings, and yet there are proofs beyond dispute. As is often seen in cases where the ground has been laid bare by one cause or another, the soil thus uncovered is far more productive than the surface soil exhausted by continued growth, and thus the variety and richness of the trees and creepers in these chines are wonderful. On a hot summer's day the sunlight falls gently in patches between the black shadows thrown by the towering walls of the chine or by the thick foliage, and the warm closeness is full of the murmur of bees and insects. On a dank day, however, when dripping trees and green slime send out exhalations, these chines are melancholy to the last degree, even in summer.
Blackgang Chine, which is almost equally popular, differs from that at Shanklin in being a great cleft between towering bare cliffs which look as if they had been built up in giant blocks.
The Undercliff is a special and very striking feature of the island. It is a strip of land lying under a great cliff along the south side; it is from a quarter to half a mile broad, and the cliff overlooking it is as perpendicular as those usually found only above sea-beaches. Bit by bit the cliff has broken away in great masses, and the pieces lie as they have fallen, embedded in a tangle of greenery which has rapidly veiled them. As the Undercliff faces south, and is sheltered by this continuous wall of chalk and sandstone, it may be imagined that in summer it is intensely hot.
CHAPTER VI FOOTPRINTS OF THE INVADERS
Among the antiquities of the island the Roman villa at Brading must certainly rank first. This was discovered by the late Mr. Hilton Price, F.S.A. The villa consisted of a central block with a wing on each side. The central part was doubtless occupied by the owner, and the two wings by his slaves and soldiers. There are traces of two distinct periods of occupation, and indications that the villa was ultimately destroyed by fire. In the course of the excavations tiles, broken pottery, coins, bronze implements and other things were unearthed in quantities.
The writer on the Isle of Wight in the Victoria County Histories says:
"Not quite the whole of the villa probably has been explored; the baths, for instance, are not yet found. But we have ample details, and can form a general judgment. The villa at Brading was neither of the best period nor of special size and splendour, but neither was it a farmhouse. It must have been the residence of men of the upper classes, owners (we may suppose) of broad acres all around. They may not have possessed great wealth or many articles of luxury; they may have carried such things away with them when they abandoned the house. Some time in the dim period of which we know so little, early in the fifth century, the place was burnt by enemy or accident, and the Romano-British life which it had sheltered came utterly to an end."