Castle of Comfort, a lonely public-house on the top of the Mendips, standing by the side of the Bristol and Wells road.  For the tourist it forms a very convenient landmark from which to indicate the more interesting features of the Mendip plateau. (1) The Roman road from Uphill to Old Sarum may be traced across a field near the house. (2) The Devil’s Punch Bowl, one of the most notable swallets on the Mendips, is 1/4 m. nearer Bristol (climb a wall on the R. and the swallet, a funnel-shaped hollow, partly overgrown with brushwood, will be seen in a field about 100 yards from the roadside). (3) The old Roman lead mines are 2-1/2 m. away on the road to Charterhouse. (4) The “Lamb’s Lair” cavern (now unexplorable) lies 2 m. to the N. near the Bristol road. (5) Nine Barrows, to find which take the Wells road; 1/2 m. to the S. is another solitary inn, and opposite are the barrows.

Catcott, a village on the Poldens, 3 m.  S. of Edington Station.  The church is quaint; note, in particular, the old oak seats, and the odd means by which they can be lengthened.  There is an old octagonal font.

Chaffcombe, a secluded village on the slope of Windwhistle Hill, 2-1/2 m.  N.E. from Chard.  The church is a small Dec. building with a Perp.  W. tower containing a pre-Reformation bell.

Chantry, or Little Elm, a small village 4-1/2 m.  S.W. from Frome.  The church is a beautiful bit of modern Gothic, designed by Sir G. Scott.

Chapel Allerton, a village 4-1/2 m.  S.W. from Axbridge.  The church is a 13th-cent. building which has been subsequently altered and enlarged.  In the parish are the remains of an old “hundred stone,” marking the boundaries of the hundred of Bempstone.

CHARD, a market town of 4437 inhabitants, at the S. extremity of the county, served by both the G.W.R. and L. & S.W.R.  Chard is a pleasant variant upon the usual cramped type of Somerset county town.  It spreads itself out up the side of a hill with a magnificent disregard for ground values in one broad and breezy street a mile long.  Its situation is remarkable for the impartiality of its maritime predilections, for the runnels at the side of the thoroughfare are said to discharge their contents, the one into the Bristol, the other into the English Channel.  Its early name, Cerde (for Cerdic), implies its Saxon origin, but it was a benefaction of Bishop Joceline, who gave half his manor for its extension, which really made the town.  Chard has figured a little in history.  Charles I. and Fairfax both made some stay in it.  Penruddock suffered a severe reverse in the neighbourhood in 1655, and Monmouth, in 1685, marched through Chard en route, as he thought, for the throne, a circumstance which Jeffreys did not allow the town to forget.  “Hangcross tree,” which once stood near the L. & S.W. station, was long locally reputed to be the gibbet on which some of the Duke’s sympathisers expiated their