In spite of the pressure of other important news, we
must save a few lines in which to record the sale of Stonehenge by auction at Salisbury on Tuesday. It was sold for £6,600 to a local landowner, Mr. C. H. E. Chubb. To think that the most famous monument in the world should have been bought on the spur of the moment—Mr. Chubb entered the room with no thought of bidding—for a price which hundreds of collectors would have given not so long ago for a picture, a piece of tapestry, or a rare curio 1 The very ownership of the place confers fame. And Mr. Chubb has secured this by an investment which, according to the figures announced, brings in 5 per cent. " I thought a Salisbury man ought to own it," said Mr. Chubb afterwards. Such local pride is of course in the right spirit, and gives us an earnest that Mr. Chubb will treat his precious possession with care, respect, and a sense of his great responsibility. It is well to feel a guarantee of this, slime the monument is not where we should wish it to be—in the possession of the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty.
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