The river Stour hath its source in Sturton Parke, and gives the name [Stourhead.-J.  B.] to that ancient seat of the Lord Sturtons.  Three of the springs are within the park pale and in Wiltshire; the other three are without the pale in Somersetshire.  The fountaines within the parke pale are curbed with pierced cylinders of free stone, like tunnes of chimneys; the diameter of them is eighteen inches.  The coate armour of the Lord Sturton is, Sable, a bend or, between six fountaines; which doe allude to these springs.  Stour is a British word, and signifies a great water:  sc. “dwr” is water; “ysdwr” is a considerable, or great water:  “ys”, is “particula augens”. [The Stour rises near the junction of the three counties, Wiltshire, Somersetshire, and Dorsetshire.  Its course is chiefly through the last mentioned county, after leaving which it enters Hampshire, and flows into the South Avon near Christchurch.- J. B.]
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Deverill hath its denomination from the diving of the rill, and its rising again.  Mr. Cambden saieth, In this shire is a small rill called Deverill, which runneth a mile under ground,* like as also doth the little river Mole in Surry, and the river Anas [Guadiana ?-J.  B.] in Spain, and the Niger in Africk.  Polybius speakes the like of the river Oxus, “which, falling with its force into great ditches, which she makes hollow, and opens the bottome by the violence of her course, and by this meanes takes its course under ground for a small space, and then riseth again.” (lib. x.)

* I am informed by the minister of Deverill Longbridge, and another gentleman that lived at Maiden Bradley thirty years, that they never knew or heard of this river Deverall that runs underground.-(Bishop tanner.) [Yet Selden, in his “Notes to Drayton’s Poly-Olbion”, makes the same statement as Aubrey does respecting the Deverill.- J. B.]

“Sic ubi terreno Lycus est epotus hiatu, Existit procul hinc, alioq{ue} renascitur ore.  Sic modò combibitur, tecto modò gurgite lapsus Redditur Argolicis ingens Erasinus in arvis:  Et Mysum capitisq{ue} sui ripaq{ue} prioris Pœnituisse ferunt, aliò nunc ire, Calcum.” — Ovid, Metamorph. lib. xv.

In Grittleton field is a swallow-hole, where sometimes foxes, &c. doe take sanctuary; there are severall such in North Wiltshire, made by flouds, &c.; but neer Deene is a rivulet that runnes into Emmes-poole, and nobody knowes what becomes of it after it is swallowed by the earth.

[The reader will find a full account of the remarkable “swallows”, or “swallow holes”, in the course of the river Mole, in Brayley’s History of Surrey, vol. i. p. 171-185, with a map, and some geological comments by Dr. Mantell.  The river, or stream designated by Aubrey as the Deverill, is probably the principal of several streams which rise near the villages of Longbridge Deverill, Hill Deverill, Brixton Deverill, Monkton Deverill, and Kingston Deverill (in the south west part of Wiltshire), and, after running through Maiden Bradley, flow into the Wyley near Warminster.-J.  B.]
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