taken to indicate a later date : though this being an iron region , the use of iron may have been known earlier here than elsewhere. The curious Minnis Rocks, almost a unique specimen of an ancient hermitage, half way up the northern slope of the hill, still preserve the tradition of a British settlement, for menys is the old British for a steep ascent, and would not have been an inappropriate name for the town itself.
On the neighbouring Castle Hill was a similar town or camp, also triangular in shape, but much smaller defended towards its base, by the high embankment still discernible on the northern and eastern faces of the Lady's Parlour, and by the natural steepness of the remaining sides ; and this would correspond with what Caesar tells us of the tactics of their Venetan allies : that when forced out of one of their towns, they would pass over in their shipping to another in the immediate vicinity , and that then the siege operations had to be commenced anew.
But it was not on these heights, exposed to the full force of the south-western gales and from which they could have had no easy access to their ships that they were likely to have fixed their permanent abodes. The site of the town, in which in more peaceful times they passed their lives, would be to the right of the Priory Valley ; where they would be sheltered from the storms of the Channel, and where the fleets -- in which these hardy sailors crossed the seas and even navigated the Bay of Biscay -- could be moored in perfect safety: and this lower town must also have had defences raised as much against -
