One of the most interesting studies for the topographer lies in tracing the origin of the names of the streets of a town; and the names of the principal streets of Weymouth are distinctly traceable to their origin. St. Nicholas’ Street derives its name from the patron-saint of maritime towns; Francis Street comes probably from Franchise; Boot Lane (formerly Buckler’s), from an inn called “The Boot”; Helen Lane, from Queen Eleanor, who held the manor of Melcombe; Maiden Street, from Queen Elizabeth, who united the boroughs; and St. Edmund’s Street, St. Thomas’ Street, and St. Mary’s Street, possibly from chapels dedicated in honour of these saints.
The Old Stocks, Weymouth.
THE ISLE OF PORTLAND
By Mrs. King Warry
O the stranger of antiquarian or geological tastes Portland must ever be of interest; but the casual visitor—seeing it for the first time in the glare of the noonday sun, amidst eddying clouds of stone-dust tossed hither and thither by blustering winds, or when the over-charged atmosphere settles like a misty cap on the Verne Heights—is apt, if he have formed expectations, to be woefully disappointed. The fact is that nowhere, perhaps, is the Spirit of Place more coy and difficult of access than in modern Portland, having retreated before barracks, fortifications, and prison, before traction-engines and signs of commercial prosperity. But, properly wooed, it can still be won, and once found, how well it repays the trouble of seeking! A mere cycle run or drive through the island is emphatically not the way to see Portland Isle, especially the Portland of the past. The visitor needs to walk, saunter, and lounge idly for at least a few days, and then, if he have a well-stored mind and fail to experience the subtle, indefinable sensation called “charm,” he must be strangely lacking in that spiritual perception which alone makes man feel at one with the universe and with God.
The convict establishment and Government quarries have displaced much which lent an interest to the island; the barracks and harbour works have displaced still more—but fortunately we retain a few records which, scanty though they be, reveal a something of the past. Gone is the barrow of that king whose very name is lost; and this supposed last resting-place of a mighty chieftain, swept through long centuries by pure sea-laden breezes, is now desecrated by quarrying operations: the barrow of Celtic Bran is but an empty name, though Mound Owl still remains in part, a silent witness of Saxon prowess and possibly of the fierceness of the contest maintained so long in Royal Dorset.
Gone, also, is the sometime well-preserved earthwork on the Verne Hill, formerly attributed to Roman or Dane, and now believed to have been older than either. Only a slight vestige of the double fosse-way remains; though an old man, but lately passed away, has told us that in the days of his youth he could stand on that part of the West Cliff known as Priory and distinctly trace it throughout its length as it tended downwards towards the harbour, once the scene alike of peaceful commercial intercourse or sanguinary combats. Looking across Portland Mere from the hill-top, one can imagine it all—from the probable peaceful Phœnician trader and Roman trireme to the Viking rovers and much-dreaded “long ships,” even as can be pictured in some degree the character of the opposite coast before the altered tidal action inside Portland breakwater had caused beautiful Smallmouth Sands to vanish and Sandsfoot Castle to stand perilously near the crumbling cliff-edge in ruinous state; whilst the opposite Portland Castle still remains, casting much of its original reflection in the Mere waters, a standing witness to the uneasy conscience of Henry VIII. respecting French designs.
Page upon page of unwritten history lay open to the observant eye as recently as some sixty years or so ago, all traces of which are rapidly vanishing before modern requirements. Barrows, earthworks, and so-called Druidical circles were then so strongly in evidence (especially one well-preserved circle near where the prison Governor’s house now stands) as to make one think that religious observances of one kind or another must have been strongly marked during those early days. Indeed, the Bill itself—cleaving the clear waters within sight of the foam-tossed Race and equally dangerous Shambles, its point accentuated by the curious outstanding Pulpit Rock—is often termed “Beel” by the old islanders, and is by some supposed to derive its name from Baal.