But what is yonder Hill, whose dusky brow.
“Eggardon Hill is a very high hill, and gives name to the hundred. Mr. Coker says it is uncertain whether it takes its name from Edgar, king of the West Saxons, or from Orgarus, earl of Cornwall: and indeed this last derivation is the truest; there being little reason to doubt that it is the old Orgarestone. The camp on the brow of this hill is a large and strong fortification, and seems to be Roman.”—Hutchins’s Dorset, vol. i. p. 289; where there is an engraving of this camp. But Hutchins has misrepresented Mr. Coker, who indeed prefers the derivation from Orgar. His words are these: “That it takes name from Edgar, the West Saxon king, I dare not affirm, having nothing to prove it but the nearnesse of the name. It better likes me to think this the place which in Doomsday-book is called Orgareston; but whether it take name from Orgareus, earl of Cornwall, I know not; though I think I should run into no great error to believe it.”—Coker’s Survey of Dorsetshire, p. 26.
[Note 12, page 33, line 2.]
The ground where Hollis lies; his choice retreat.
“Mr. Hollis, in order to preserve the memory of those heroes and patriots for whom he had a veneration, as the assertors and defenders of his country, called many of the farms and fields in his estate at Corscombe by their names; and by these names they are still distinguished. In the middle of one of those fields, not far from his house, he ordered his corpse to be deposited in a grave ten feet deep; and that the field should be immediately ploughed over, that no trace of his burial-place might remain.”—Memoirs of Thomas Hollis, Esq. vol. i. p. 481.
[Note 13, page 34, line 1.]
War-glutted Osmund, superstitious lord!
Of the strange curse belonging to Shireburne-Castle. From a MS. of the late Bishop of Ely (Bishop John More) now in the Royal Library at Cambridge.
“Osmund, a Norman knight, who had served William Duke of Normandy from his youth, in all his wars against the French king, and the duke’s (William’s) subjects, with much valour and discretion, for all his faithful service (when his master had by conquest obteyned the crown of England) was rewarded with many great gifts; among the which was the earldome of Dorsett, and the gift of many other possessions, whereof the castle and baronie of Sherburne were parcell. But Osmund, in the declyninge of his age, calling to mynde the great effusion of blood which, from his infancie, he had shedd; he resolved to leave all worldly delights, and betake himself to a religious life, the better to contemplate on his former sinnes, and to obteyn pardon for them. And, with much importunitie, having gotten leave of the kinge (who was unwilling to want the assistance of so grave and worthy a counsellor) to resign his temporal honors; and having obteyned the bishoprick of Sarum, he gave Sherburne, with other lands, to the bishoprick. To which gift he annexed this curse:—
“‘That whosoever should take those lands from the bishoprick, or diminish them in great or in small, should be accursed, not only in this world, but also in the world to come; unless in his life-time he made restitution thereof.’ And so he died bishop of Sarum.”