Welcome to an expanded and more profusely illuatrated Quickeilver Messenger Number 2. In thia issue we publish for the first time anywhere details of Mike Collier's discovery of a terrestrial zodiac in Sussex. We proudly present an anti-Darwinist article by John Michelle. (Anti-Darwinism is a vital trend in radical philosophy which is gathering momentum and could potentially make a colossal impact on our understanding of and concept of mankind) Plus, the second part of Colin Bloy's 'Ley Dowsing'; a strange phenomena section; in mysterious Hove (you think Hove's boring?-read this:); reviews of books, T.V. and events; plus letters.


Next Issue : In QsM. Number 3 there will be articles on Hove's long barrow; the Priory Mount in Lewes; the conflict between urban and rural culture; the Long Man of Wilmington; Edqerton Sykes; unpublished material by J. Foster Forbes; and reviews.

Again a good way to get the knack is to start with an established mediaeval church. In our experience they are all on dowseable ley-lines. There are at least two in the form of a cross - one line generally on the E.W. axis and the other roughly N.S.linking up with adjacent sites then fall within the Watkins context. There may be more. Generally they emerge from side-doors, open or blocked-up. There is also a circle which passes through the four.

Go to such a church in the anticipation of finding them. Get your visualisations right. Separate out drains and cables. Look for mysterious, unconventional energy something like an inter-dimensional frontier.

At the appropriate points, the rods will cross, and you will have found your first ley-line. It is a different experience, it will change your life for it will perhaps be the first contact with a different dimension of reality which opens up a new vision of life in real, not just theoretical terms.

Ley-lines are not constraints. Watkins suggested that here was a system of alignements which was based on megalithic, and neolithic sites (mediaeval churches getting in on act as they were built on ancient sites) as if it were a matter of antiquarian interest only. The dowsing experience shows that it is dynamic and evolving.

The presumption that it is a phenomenon of the distant past has excluded from the calculations nodes of later provenance which dowsing shows to be valid.

Watkins, then Thom et al studied ley-lines diachromitically and chartered conventional views of early man. This should not, however, prevent us as dowsers from a more profound understanding of the phenomenon. What the dowsing of ley-lines tends to explain is what ley statisticians have occasionally noted with anguish that places like Aldermaston, G.P.O. microwave towers, and the like fall on calculated leys, which is, of course, impossible.

Impossible until one dowses them and finds that such modern sacred sites are connected to ancient sacredsites by dowseable energy lines - and instead of saying that's impossible, they say "why"? Try B.B.C. T.V. and radio transmitters, important offices of political parties, modern churches of certain sects, (Mormons, for one) Town Halls, large banks, geometrically built stately homes, modern war-memorials. The whole ley scene looks awfully different.

The Dragon Project, organised by Paul Devereux, Jon Steele and Don Robins, is a tenacious attempt to study with conventional instruments and dowsing techniques, what goes on in and around stone circles. Already Professor John Taylor of Kings College, London has shown that shifting electro-magnetic fields exist around megaliths. The Dragon Project is showing similar and more profound results.

Nonetheless, the dowser has known for some time that ley energies involve aspects of eloctro-magnetic, radioactive, electro-static and gravitic fields, in a way which makes it appear not that they combine together to form a ley field but that their presence in ley fields seems to indicate rather that they are manifestations in certain circumstances of ley-energy, as if they were not independent fields in their own right, as we are accustomed to view them to the extent that ley energy and the unified field theory may have much in common.

Whatever this field may be, the fact that it may be dowsed and the fact that dowsing is a form on mental probing rather than physical reaction, may suggest that it also has a lot in common with consciousness.

A further aspect of this consideration emerges when, after having dowsed one's first ley-line, one begins to analyse them in greater detail, and finds that there are different sorts of ley-line, and the factor that distinguishes them in dowsing terms is the number of parallels in each line.

A "simple" line is two parallels, that is to say the rods react twice as one crosses it. Others can be 4,5,16,24,32,48,69, or even triple 64's if one dowses the great main lines of countries and continents.

It may be observed that the number of parallels seams to indicate the greater or lesser importance if the line-cathedrals are on triple 64's.

However, in certain circumstances, it may also be observed that lines do not remain constant or static. They can evolve. for a period from a double in a line of a greater number of parallels - and in the circumstances where one is able to attribute a cause, it is invariably due to a human act of a specific nature on one of the node points in the system - as an example a particularly aware priest and congregation in an act of worship or the killing of bulls in a corrida, to quote but two examples.

It may be argued that in both sets of circumstances the state of consciousness of the participants is abnormal in some way, and whatever the nature of it, it appears to be the course of some agitation of the line for a period of time; the effect may decay within minutes or hours, sometimes whole days. Thus not only do we perceive ley energy through a particular state of consciousness but also ley energy reacts to certain states of consciousness as well.


Now a tentative hypothesis for the appearance of contemporary nodes in the ley system may perhaps be established by a re-appraisal of the function of the altar in society. What unites a stone circle, standing stone, mediaeval and modern church altar, wells and springs ancient and modern, T.V. masts, nuclear power plants, etc? Why are they node points?

Whereas the well or spring was vital to the existence of early man's existence - in his nomadic aspect, he had to move from spring to spring, and in his agrarian phase, he could only establish his permanent dwelling around one, thus the natural religious instinct became focussed on the well and spring as the source of well-being or, conversely misfortune. Thus it was the residence of the god or tutelary spirit. More formal religious sites were always associated with wells and springs and they and the place of formal worship became inseperable. What they had in common was that they were focus of groups and individual consciousness, as are nuclear stations, political party H.Q., banks, palaces, T.V. masts and so on. When all is said and done, the group consciousness does take account of them as the sources of some fundamental contribution to the group voice.

Thus the establishment of a nuclear power station at Dungeness may attract a line through it by some sort of magnetic effect, we are putting a new factor in a situation of balanced forces, which have to realign themselves to adjust to the new balance. Thus the creation of his private abbey at Fonthill by Wellian Bechford dragged to one side the Stonehenge line. Thus the erection of the obelisk of black Nubian granite at Gronnesbury Cemetary as a memorial to those victims of the Katyn massacre created a new equilibrium. Such acts are deliberate and focal and thus new, dowseable energy pathe are created.

We may perhaps be permitted to describe ley lines and their node points as forms of condensed consciousness; at least that seems to be one of the common denominators. They are points of important reference in the human experience.

Thus the ley energy phenomen may be seen both to derive from and be stimulated by deliberate (not necessarily consciously) acts of human awareness. And thus, somewhat more than tenuously, a connexion may be established between the recognised physical fields and human consciousness, awareness, and will - a connexion, which, if valid, would provide a locus for magic and miracles.

And before you go dowsing ley-lines, make sure you know then that is what you could be getting into. I do not utter such a note of caution in some way to mystify or create a "frisson" around our work: too much primarily valid data has been squandered in that way. I say that because you are entering into the world of the apparently partial, the ephemeral, the intangible, the subtle, which if they are in intimate relationships with human consciousness, may exercise an effect on the participant, in this case the dowser, for which he may be unprepared, and therefore vulnerable. For the evidence indicates that whereas the theory of condensed human consciousness may be valid it is only one side of the coin. It is a two-way business, indicating that these node points are frontiers. In the state of perception that recognises their existence, one is not only observinq, but in that state, receptive. Not all the nodes are "good".

A healer or medium at work may be observed by the dowser to be pluqged into the permanent ley line during the period of activity, as if they were drawing in energy, and projecting it. Experiments show that in the dowsing frame of mind or brain rythym, "artificial" ley-lines may be projected anywhere - one of our experiments was to Washington D.C. It was instantaneous - we had an open telephone link at the time. It may be stated that this energy is available for "good" and may be manipulated in that way. The corollary is obvious. One cannot award the "religious" context for a satisfactory explanation of it all, and there is much to suggest that the world is manuchean, dualist, polar, ying-yang etc. Good and evil are identifiable, dowseable forces and as two examples out of 3,000 at node points where the energy is functional, the following symbols or field effects are significant.

They may be dowsed by using the feet as the marker; when they are following the form, the rod remains closed, when you move off it, the rods open - thus in virgin dust or snow, you may draw these forms by trudging.


It is also worthwhile photographing sites where dowseable energy is at work. It sometimes appears on the film, although it is easy to throw them away, believinq them to be "fogged".

A simple dowsing of ley-lines is a harmless but significant experience. But if you take it further, and your interest makes you more than a mere observer, then it is well to bear in mind that what you are doing is repeating the mediaeval quest for the Holy Grail.

We are coming to realise more and more that the old legends and folk memories are traces of fundamental truths, sometimes deliberately disguised, and sometimes shrouded in shifting mist because the vocabulary used to describe them does not correspond to what we are accustomed to expect in this Cartesian age and uses an imagery not derived from Renaissance Greek and Latin neologisms, which now pass for veracity and respectability.

The vision of the Holy Grail may at first appreciation appear to us to be a romantic and fanciful notion, but if one were to describe the experience as one in which the individual in a state of alpha-brain rythym as recorded on an electroencephalograph may attain a state of perception which transcends conventional sensually perceived data, outside the established space-time continuum which normal consciousness exists, it at least has a tenuous veracity about it because the vocabulary is more impressive.

And that is why knights went on journeys down tracks in woods via springs, wells and chapels, rescuing maidens and killing dragons. The dragon is the spiral chaotic energy form the dowser can erceive in certain circumstances. The organising of it into straight lines of particular numerical value is a way of saving the maiden, the earth goddess, bea, and establishing equilibrium between man and nature. For this he uses his sword, the sword of evolved consciousness, the focus of the disinterested will, the Michael energy, to use a hopelessly unscientific concept, but one which is the basis of all paranormal phenomena.

If such ideas are valid, then the words of caution are perhaps important. The vigils and disciplines of the knights of old and their aspirations to virtue, their care of their swords, shields and buckles were a way of expressing their attention to the spiritual disciplines and protections so essential if the quest is to be successful; and one is not to fall foul of some wicked knight or monster on the way. It got their brain rhythms right.

Thus we must cast aside all hopes of material advantage from such a study; if we intervene in any way, it must be for the good of this, without hope of any reward, save that of knowing that one does the cosmic will. For motive is significant, and the power of love all-conquering if governed.

Remember the lesson of Doctor Faustus: Goethe was an initiate, and knew what he was talking about - and the Faustian path is without value in the long run.

If you really want to get into ley-dowsing, be prepared and suitably armoured. It can have pitfalls for the unwary but be a great joy for the hopeful and the organised.

And at the same time the most subtle instrument of all, the human mind, is identifying energy forms not otherwise available to established science. It is not a consistent phenomenon, capable of laboratory analysis on a regular basis because it depends on transitory phenomenon and conditions. However, the demonstration of a reality that is not constant, that is partial and ephemeral, that is real according to certain states of mind if accepted, may unlock the door to the greater understanding of the misnamed para-normal, the magical, the miraculous, and rescue man from the mechanistic and dialectically materialist trap he has got himself into, or has been put into, and thus cut himself off from a reality infinitely greater than the sensual world in which we intellectually live - which if we do not all call it Marxist, we certainly call materialist, in the metaphysical sense, both of which may well be the greatest delusions of all.

The world of subtle energies, the greater reality, is a Kabbalistic world where number and form are the means of identifying the primary and proto-primary states of matter, that is to say that, whereas we are accustomed to the concept of a periodic table of elements, that this table is dependant on the number of electrons around a nucleus for its sequence, atomic physics in its study of sub-atomic realities has identified particles which perform in subtle ways, which pop in and out of our continuum; we do know that molecular form is as important to reality as the ability to identify the number of atoms present. Thus we cannot ignore number and form when we seek to describe the material world.

The dowsing of ley energies, which may be a manifestation of the very life force, reveals number and form to be significant. Perhaps the old alchemists and mystery schools were right. Pyramids create dowseable energies - so do geometrical forms drawn on paper. A pendulum will give a numerical answer to an analysis of ley energies. A study of geometrical symbol in politics and religious orders may show a relationship between form and effect on the human psyche. The cross and the swastika may be shown to produce dowseable energies.

The following symbolical forms are not without siqnificance, albeit highly esoteric.

The recurrent form in geometric structures of the octagon is also relevant. The number 8 is worthy of study.


The dowsing of ley energies brings one into the world of Kabbalistic numerology and it may be that the more subtle forms of reality are valid in terms of number and form. "Rhythms of vision" by Lawrence Blair is helpful here.

"The secret source of Avalon's mystique, the bubbling fount of all its legends, the magnet that drew so many saints, kings and pilgrims, is all the more mysterious for being invisible". This is the Glastonbury Zodiac, claimed by it's discoverer, Katherine Maltwood, as at once the oldest and biggest of Britain's antiquities. This great goemantic circle of giant effigies, ten miles across and thirty miles round, has so far been totally ignored by cautious Establishment archaeologists. It is Too Big to be Seen, Too Good to be True:

Modelled in relief by hills and lesser contours, outlined in part by streams which follow these round, the effigies are essentially natural - yet the outlines have been completed by man through the ages, by roads, paths and canals and embellished by tumuli, ramparts and lynchets at the nodal points. Preposterous! Maybe, but there on the map are the twelve signs of the zodiac in correct order in a circle....

I can think of no better introduction to a piece on these rather elusive signs than the above, written by Mary Caine in "The Glastonbury Giants or Zodiac" (An Arthurian Reflection) - ((Glastonbury - edited by Anthony Roberts)).

When Mrs Maltwood discovered it half a century ago, she equated the figures with the Arthurian legends and suggested that the circle was the original Round Table. Since then other zodiacs have been found, at Pumpsaint in Wales, Nuthampstead in Hertfordshire and Kingston in Surrey. There is literature available on these by Lewis Edwards, Nigel Peninck and Mary Caine respectively. There are also others that have been written about, albeit some of them rather tentatively.

The Stonegate (Tunbridge Wells) Terrestrial Zodiac

It appears that we have one in Sussex, overflowing into Kent and not far from the Surrey border; roughly twice the size of the Glastonbury circle. It is twenty miles across and virtually on the same latitude, centred around the village of Stonegate. (A pin was put into the map at Stonegate and another at Glastonbury and a line between them actually went through Stonehenge. However, do not regard this as too accurate, it is merely a point of interest). The zodiac stretches from Danehill in the west to Bodiam in the east and from Hellingly in the south to Tunbridqe Wells in the north. It should be noted that there are some very significant place names, a real phenomenon that does occur in this and associated 'earth mysteries', for want of a better phrase.

AQUARIUS: As at Glastonbury, the phoenix. Flightshott farm nearby.	PISCES: A whale with the lovely Bayham Abbey at its mouth and Jews Wood in its belly. There is another fish attached.
TAURUS: At Mayfield an outline of just head and hoof. This is common amongst some zodiacs instead of the whole animal.	CANCER: Here is a superb outline of a crab; this is very significant as so far not one has emerged on any other zodiac.
CAPRICORN: The figure associated with Pan and the earthy side of Nature is the goat-unicorn and has a satyr-like look and position with a virile appearance. Nearby is Mount Easy. This extraordinary figure has a shortage of churches and contains an H.M. Detention Centre and the incredibly named Worms Hill, Folly Hill and Nevergood.	SAGITTARIUS: The front of the figure is incomplete owing to lack of research; after all, someone once said that a zodiac contained a lifetime's work. It appears to be a Centaur, or mounted Archer, firing an arrow. Right on the head is the name The Horns which may put this in the sphere of Cernunnos but in Glastonbury it is the Arthur Figure. If the arrow is fired it hits a chapel where the map says Great Butts. Surely like Ramslye and Lions Green these placenames must be beyond coincidence.
GEMINI: A giant sitting in a boat. The boat in these cases is usually named the Argo Navis, certainly there is Argos Hill nearby. In the body of the boat is Skippers (of the boat) Hill, Sleeves Wood on the arm and the aptly named Cross-in-Hand where the hand is holding a cross of some description.	SCORPIO: An outline of the Scorpion; a water sign with the watery Bodiam Castle adjacent. As befits the death sign, it is near to the site of the Battle of Hastings.
The Stone Lions at Lions Green in Leo.
LEO: Lion's Green is in this figure with two stone lions outside a large house and lion named houses nearby. In spite of this it really looks like a hound rather than a lion; in a Babylonian zodiac this would have been so. It is worth remarking here that some of the Leo signs in the other zodiacs do not look very leonine either.	ARIES: A sitting ram with the head looking southwards towards the sea. It's tail is formed by an ancient site at Ramslye where there is the rocky formation High Rocks, well worth a visit. The horns are marked by circular paths in a wood called, of all things, Hornshurst Wood.
LIBRA: Usually represented by a dove in the middle of the circle instead of the scales but here appears to be absent. This sign was, after all, a late arrival, in Caesar's time by the Romans, and grew from one of the claws of the Scorpio. Perhaps the crow below Scorpio is something to do with this.	VIRGO: The same as in most other zodiacs, the goddess is holding a sheaf. She has been associated with a hare and here, nearby, is Harebeating. The lower part of her outline appears to be near the top of a crow's head between her and Scorpio, note the nearby town of Crowhurst. There is a precedent for this as there is a crow in the Hebden Bridge Zodiac. What is the significance of the name on her sheaf, Three Cups Corner?

STONEGATE TERRESTRIAL ZODIAC

These figures, wherever tested, are dowseable and are exactly the same as a ley. The same width, feel and with a stronger side that I always detect, like non-straight leys. It is interesting to note that in these figures the strong side of the 'ley' is always on the outside edge of the figure.

Therefore it is reasonably safe to suggest that these outlines are really part of a broader pattern, namely the whole ley system itself. If we wish to find an answer to these mysterious straight lines linking important and sacred sites then the zodiacs and other figures should be taken into account.

Arthurians might do well to direct a glance at Sussex when they say that he is buried at Glastonbury, for apart from Camberlot to the south of the circle, if you look at Sagittarius the Arthur figure, you will see Glassenbury and The Moor. At the end of the 'High History of the Holy Grail', as Mrs Maltwood reminded us, it says that he lies buried at the end of The Moors adventurous.

What is the purpose of it all? If there is an answer that we can understand it is not apparent to us yet but let us leave the last word to Mary Caine who has, after all, done more zodiac research than any other person living..

"The zodiac pattern is written not only in the stars, but on human form and character, on animals, plants and even minerals. It is also, it seems, inscribed on the very face of the earth itself - perhaps a11 over the world. It is, I suggest, a pattern made by the forces or laws of creation in their own image, inscribing themselves on all created matter, as if they, the tools of the creator, left their characteristic mark. It is not only a pattern in space but in time; history, examined with this sequence in mind, betrays the same design".

High Rocks (Ramslye) in Aries

From: Derek Banks, Poplar, London E.14.

I recently spent a few days walking in the South Downs in the region of your Alfriston Ley Line and came up with a few discoveries. You may of course already know of them.

First the Norman Priory at Wilmington has its original gatehouse, which is now blocked up and forms a wall of the museum, so aligned as to face the Long Man, with one of the barrows of Windover hill visible in the same line. Although this is only 3 points aligned it does represent a classic reLationship between a lowland village sacred site and a hilltop shrine. There must be more material there.

My other discovery is of a model hollow road near Friston TQ553986, which is part of a path across fields to the east of Friston Place. Marked on OS as a public right of way. There were no visual clues to an alignment on this road, but a map ley seems to indicate Westdean church and a barrow to the west of that as being on the same line.

Of all subjects I have ever written about, the one that always brings the most lively response from readers is that of evolution and Darwinism. Some people seem quite upset that one should doubt Darwin's theory, and the tone of their letters is often that of people who feel their deepest religious convictions are being challenged. Many writers have identified the Darwinian faith as a form of secular religion. More exactly, it is a cosmogony or creation myth, and it has the same magical, fairy-tale appeal as have all traditional cosmogonies. In Darwin's myth, cells of their own accord group themselves to form more complicated organisms, these seperate themselves into species, which transmute miraculously into other species, and finally one of these, an ape-like creature, develops a higher consciousness and becomes a human being. As a fairy tale it seems harmless enough, but higher claims have been made for Darwin's account of the evolution of life: ihat it is literally true as biological fact and that it illustrates the ruling principle in the universe of spontaneous organization and growth. This principle is represented in human nature by our aggressive, inventive characteristics which have made us the 'fittest' of all races and thus the legitimate rulers of creation.

The way things have happened over the last hundred years has been so closely related to the progress of the Myth of Darwinism that it is impossible to make sense of it without oonsidering the nature of this myth, its origin and the ideas and actions it has tended to prove.

Every culture has its conventional cosmogony or creation myth which serves to explain how everything from the beginning of the world to the appearance of life and human consciousness first came about. These various myths both reflect and influence the cultures they belong to, and determine the ways in which people think and relate to their surroundings. The myth sanctifies the action. Most educated people at the time when Darwin's Origin of Species was published in 1850 believed that civilization was advancing towards a kind of rationalistic millenium. Intoxicated by the discoveries in science, psychology and economics which followed, many of them came to believe that their class and race held all keys to the future, and they looked forward to the approaching triumph of order, empire and moralistic religion throughout the world. They saw history as a pyramid of accumulated knowledge with themselves at its tip, and they regarded nature similarly, as a hierarchy which ascended from slugs and snails and puppy dogs' tails to apes, savage men, tame men, English men and, on top of the whole pile, the English professor type, Charles Darwin, using the priestly language of science, who created the desired myth to justify the established prejudices of his generation. Darwinism quickly prevailed, not because it passed any scientific tests, but because the idea behind it so exactly coincided with the ideas of the ruling classes, races and interests of the time. From a speculative biological theory it soon became elevated to dogma ("The evolution of life is no longer a theory. It is a fact. It is the basis of all our thinking." - Sir Julian Huxley, 1959), and disbelievers were stigmatized as heretics or worse.

The new myth of human nature as an accidental development from animal nature rapidly defeated the only rival in the field, the outworn myth of God's Creation in 4009 B.C. All educated people acknowledged that it was now scientifically established that man was a beast at heart. His instincts were those of a savage beast, and it was only the power of modern, rational civilization that kept those instincts in check. This type of civilization had been developed by the white races alone. They had evolved further than all others. They represented the peak of humanity. They had achieved their pre-eminence by the operation of natural selection, the 'survival of the fittest', and it was therefore necessary in future to ensure that natural selection kept on operating in their favour and against the dark soul of the African and the primitivism of the shaman and mystic. Kindly people sent off trousers, missionaries and Presbyterian morals to help raise the benighted natives. Others, more 'realistic', understood that the primitives were beyond help. They had lost out in the race to be the 'fittest', and nature had already passed sentence on them. Primitive people, wrote Leonard Woolf as recently as 1937, are "the flotsam and jetsom of human history. They are the middle term between the life of animals and the life of civilization." On this understanding, colonials in all continents believed that killing off the aboriginals was not really murder since these people were only on the way to becoming fully human.

The rise of Darwinism led to genocide as directly as did the rise of Nazi ideas in Germany. Hitler was a staunch Darwinian, and his obsession with making his own race the 'fittest' was no personal aberration, but derived from the scientific orthodoxy of his time. And we can trace his ideas on racial breeding back to one of its prime sources. "What an extraordinary effect might be produced on our race if its object was to unite in marriage those who possessed the finest and most suitable natures, mental, moral and physical:" wrote Francis Galton, Darwin's cousin and close colleague, in 1865.

To help bring this about, he proposed keeping a register of 'superior' families who should be encouraged to interbreed, and thus "further the ends of evolution more rapidly and with less distress than if events were left to their own course. Darwin himself agreed that Galton's proposal was the "sole feasible" way of proceeding. "The object seems a grand one" he wrote, yet he feared that Galton was too idealistic and that people would never cooperate intelligently with a rational breeding policy.

Darwin's theory began as biological speculation. He himself looked rather like an ape, and it occurred to him that people were more like apes than, say, pigs. There was no proof in his time of any lines of descent between spectes, nor have any been proved since; and Darwin's excuse, that the scantiness of the fossil record explained why there was no evidence of 'missing linlcs', no longer holds good. Despite the intensive search for over a hundred years for missing links, only one has ever turned up - the notorious Piltdown skull.


This skull is made up of some ancient fragments dug up by Richard Aeakey in Kenya in 1972. Mrs Leakey added the plaster (the white parts) by intuition, and the manufactured whole was pronounced by her husband to represent the skeleton features of an ape-like man who lived nearly three million years ago.

This was indeed a link between men and apes, because it consisted of an ape's jaw stuck onto a human skull by one or more dishonest evolutionists who were desperate to prove their case. The leading suspect as the hoaxer is Teilhard de Chardin who tried to make a religion out of evolutionism. Piltdown was the sacred relic of this faith. A11 theother ape-man candidates - Java man, Peking man and those from Africa were constructed by evolutionists out of bone fragments, sometimes from pieces of different individuals scattered round a site. The illustrations here below show how the trick is done: some ancient bone fragments, much plaster and a great deal of imagination. From these objects, which have much in common with the fake mermaids once exhibited in museums, are 'reconstructed' the hairy monsters featured in the text books of evolutionist propaganda for children.

People say "Oh, of course evolution happens; you can see it in action", and they point to local variations within species, and those made by breeders and gardeners and such effects as melanism in moths which have developed dark wings in response to industrial pollution in their habitats. But such changes are micro-effects within species. They do not effect the essential type. Some species, dogs and pigeons (which Darwin bred) for example, are more variable than others, but even they have limits. You can breed a strawberry as big as a small tomato but never as big as an orange, and there is a certain point beyond which you can not breed horses to run any faster or cows to produce more milk. Every individual deviates from its type, but when this deviation becomes exaggerated either the individual is sterile or its offspring revert back to the norm. As to melanism in moths, the blackening of their wings turned out to be a temporary, local adaptation, and as polluted areas were cleaned up the moths' wings began to lighten and to display aqain their previous patterns. Micro-changes do not, as is often assumed, mount up so as to produce a change in the species with a new strain arising which cannot breed with the original stock. Scientists have tried to prove otherwise by experiments with fast-breeding.


By an amusing coincidence, both the Sunday Times and the Observer commission artists to draw the ape-man as he appeared in life. The artists were advised by equally eminent but rival scientists, and below are the two results both published on the same day. If only one version had been published, I might have believed it.

Below, another example oŁ different reconstructions from the same data. The original in this case was some skull remnants labelled Zinjanthropus.


Fruit flies. A hundred or more generations of these insects were exposed to radiation to induce mutations. Flies were produced with legs on their heads and of different shapes and sizes, but if these were capable of breeding at all, their offspring tended to look as normal fruit flies should look. Evolutionists emphasise micro-changes, but they can give no examples of any macro-changes involving one species developing into another. It has never been known to happen, and no one has discovered a way in which it possibly could happen.

Not only Piltdown. but Darwinism itself is an almighty fraud. The first inkling I had of that came from reading Gertrude Himmelfarb's Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution, 1959, in which she exposed the extraordinarily dishonest, bullying tactics which Darwin and his followers used to promote his theory. Professor Himmelfarb's very sharp, scholarly book was as good as suppressed by being ignored by the academic critics. Almost all the anti-evolutionist literature at the time was produced by fundamentalist religious writers. From reading these, it appeared that most of them were successful in discrediting Darwinian evolution theory, but they had difficulty in establishing their own belief in a quite recent Creation. Easily the best critique of Darwinism, purely as a biological theory, is Norman Macbeth's Darwin Retried. This author is not concerned with proposing an alternative creation myth; but he demonstrates, clearly and with good humour, how completely Darwinism has failed to stand up to any of the tests appled to it, and he quotes the best Darwinian authorities to show how modern science has quietly abandoned the classical evolution theory - just as the pre-Darwin geologists had quietly abandoned the creation theory, while continuing to profess allegiance to the Myth of Darwinism. Macbeth comments that his book was noticed only by the religious people, not by the scientists to whom it was addressed. A teacher or scientist, particularly in Hritain, who openly questions Darwin's theory still does so at the risk of his or her own career. Yet the tide is rapidly turning as the weakness at the foundations and the misleading or evil effects of the Darwin Myth become ever more apparent. In this year's )ecture to the Hritish Association, John Durant delivered a withering attack on Darwinism, particularly in its social effects, tracing back to its influence the idea of the 'beast in man', that assumption which as been adopted by popular myth-makers such as Ardrey and Lorenz, and which is used to justify repression of human nature on the grounds that it is essentially bestial and aggressive. On the question of ape-men Durant observes that "all the fossil evidence concerning human origins which has been obtained to date could easily be assembled for inspection in a single small room." And all this evidenee is equivocal. As Charles Fort said, we could just as easily 'prove' from it that apes are descended from men. For a good anti-Darwin view of the controversy see M. Bowden's recent Ape-men: Fact or Fallacy.

Charles Darwin's resemblance to an ape was noted by the contemporary cartoonists.

Thomas Huxley's chain of human descent. The long-armed creature on the left is of a type unknown to either biologists or fossil-hunters and was drawn from Huxley's imagination. Between the ape types and the man there are no known links. Later, such chains always featured the piltdown ape-man. Scientists have now abandoned them, but they continue to illustrate evolutionist propaganda books for children.

So to the important question. If Darwinism is an inadequate biological theory and destructive in its effects as myth or paradigm, with what should it be replaced? Perhaps we do not need a formal creation myth at all. The attitude to nature commonly recommended by the wise is to observe it as it is without worrying about what it has been or how it might become, to discern its essential fitness, the beauty of its parts and of the whole, and the subltety of its interactions. There is no enduring mostrosity in nature, nothing in the process of becoming, but everything as it apparently should and must be. It is as if nature was created as a perfect living organism, harmonious and self-regulating, and since it appears that children and good simple people like, and are therefore entitled to, a picturesque creation myth, it may be that that aspect of things should provide its basis. Why see nature, as did the sickly Darwin, as a perpetual, painful struggle of survival and supremacy; why emphasise that aspect and make it into a paradigm for life and society as a whole, when the other principle, that of symbiosis, the mutual dependence, co-operation and delight that neighbouring species manifest to each other, is at least as evident in nature as well as being a far more profitable subject for human study? Perhaps the Fall of Man is a better myth than Man's Rise to Civilization. Are we fallen angels, with aspirations to regain paradise, or upstart apes, creatures with agressive instincts which made us supreme and which we need to cultivate to fulfil our destinies as invaders of the planets? Both are myths, and we are free to adopt whichever we choose. The question of scientific evidence is neither here nor there, because such evidence always tends to arrange itself in accordance with the dominant myth of the time. The creation myth influences not only science but the entire mode of thinking among the people who adopt it. The social effects of Darwinism are not the unpredictable side-effects of the evolution theory; they are central to it as the inevitable products of Darwins way of looking at things - so different, for example, from William Blake's. Nor was Blake a 'mere' poet and mystic. His perceptions were conditioned by and expressed in terms of an ancient cosmogeny and philosophy from the tradition that historically appeals to the highest poetic instincts in people and derives from the most long-lasting stable civilizations in antiquity. In other words, there are some ancient examples of creation myth which seem to have worked, and modern truth-seekers or myth-makers might do well to consider these rather than continue over-awed by the exclusive claims of the evolutionists.

The Goldstone is situated on a piece of land known as the Goldstone Bottom which approximates to that area of land now covered by Hove Part and the Brighton and Hove Albion football ground. The picture by H.G. Hine (c.1828) shows a group of ancient stones at Goldstone Bottom. Sicklemore, in 'History of Brighton' (published 1824) also mentions a ring of sarsens at this spot. These two factors indicate a certain authenticity of the stone which has been called into question over the years.

H.G. Hine's 1828 picture of ancient stones at Goldstone Bottom: Notice the standing stone next to the figure and the two smaller ones next to it.

The present day location of the Goldstone is in the S.W. corner of Hove Park. It is surrounded by a smaller group of stones. The unassuming tranquility of this spot hides a history of controversy and violence. The controversy as to the stones authenticity is in part brought about by the stones improbable location. To put it another way: in the popular imagination a group of ancient stones is not expected to be found in a suburban park - we're more conditioned to expect follies or fakes in parks. The violence (ritual slaughter and ritual torture) which has taken place here appears to be coincidental to it being a possible ancient site. It's worth noting though that Alfred Watkins points out that the place of execution was often located near an ancient site. He says, "assemblies were all, with very few exceptions in early days, located in Britain on ley sighting points (mound, stone, hilltop, tree, moat and ford)... and the gallows hill not far away." (The Old Straight Track' Chap. 19).

The recorded history of this site is as follows. In the early part of the nineteenth century the stone lay on the land of a Farmer Rigden, and was sited near the junction of Sackville Road and the Old Shoreham Road, where the British Rail Goods Depot is now situated. To Mr. Rigden's annoyance the stone had become the object of curiosity to a large number of visitors who came to see "The Druid Stone". Clearly the stone had established itself in the popular mind as being of ancient and religious significance at this time (without the assistance of the plaque which declares it a "Holy Stone oŁ the Druids"). Driven by a fear of having his crops damaged Farmer Rigden decided to bury the stone. A pit 16 feet deep was made by his men - and the stone was buried.

It seems that the stone had all but been forgotten until an 'antiquarian' wrote this sizzling, if charmingly phrased, letter to the editor of the Brighton and Hove Guardian on 20 April 1896.

CONCERNING THE "GOLD-STONE" (To the Editor of the Brighton and Hove Guardian)

Sir,- Is the Urban Council aware that a very ancient relic of past British worship (Druidic) known as "The Gold-Stone" and I believe the only one left of the many formerly about Brighton, has been ruthlessly buried out of sight by the enterprising and ignorant land speculator and builder? It is probably 3,000 years old, and some of your antiquarians might tell you that it ought to have been preserved in an honoured position as a landmark of the past history of Sussex.

I find this stone mentioned in the "History of Sussex" at the Hove Library, with a sketch of it and a description of how it was pitched into a big hole and covered up.

The word itself is compounded of Celtic COL, worship and Saxon STANE, stone. That it should have remained so long to be treated badly in the near end of the l9th century is no great tribute to Hove good sense. Fortunately there is yet time, as I am told the site is not built over, to raise it from its undeserved grave and put it, of course, near the site, in a place of honour. The indifference of the present qeneration in search of only money and pleasure is the cause of so many antiquities which had survived the ravages of wars and the elements rapidly disappearing within the past few years. It is very surprising that there seems to be no one in Brighton nor Hove who can plead for anything to be saved.

The absurd builder, the conceited architect, or the covetous landgrabber command the field and the Urban Council looks on complacently, handling substantial rates.

Yours truly, ANTIQUARIAN. Hove, April 20th 1896,

Some years later this letter seems to have has the desired effect. In 1906 Mr. William Hollamby, one of the Hove Commissioners, had the stone exhumed and relocated in its present position. The burial of the stone in the first place is an example of the kind of destruction of ancient sites that has been going on for a long time and is continuing. There are many examples. We need go no further than the garden of No. 13 Palmeira Avenue, Hove. A large barrow once stood here (now flattened) which contained perhaps the finest example of an amber cup ever to be found in Britain. The site was also the scene of folk customs which continued well into the l9th century. Now its gone forever. The 'Antiquarian' who wrote his angry letter could just as well write today. Try looking for some of the tumuli marked on the O.S. maps on the Downs.

But what happened to the other stones which were part of the original group? A pond stood near the original site and it has been suggested that when the pond was filled in about 1847, the stones were removed and buried there.

Victorian postcard (stsined) showing visitors at the stones.

The next mention of the stone that I've discovered is in Sept. 1960 (in the Brighton and Hove Herald) when the basic history is retold in connection with the death of one of the last of Mr. Hollamby's family, (who by this time has become the discoverer of the Goldstone:) The legend that the stone was thrown there in anger by the Devil on being frustrated by St. Dunstan in his efforts to flood the Weald, is also told. (Legends involving the Devil locating ancient stones are widespread e.g. Stonehenge, Devil's Arrows).
The story is again taken up in the same year (again in the Brighton and Hove Herald) The writer says that the smaller stones around the Goldstone were originally taken from a pond at the N.E. end of Hove Park. (He refers to an article by H.S. Toms in Sussex County Magazine of 1932). So if what he says is correct then what we originally had at the Goldstone Bottom was two groups of stones each with a pond close by at different ends of the ground.

The writer of this letter attempts to demystify the Goldstone and debunk the idea that it's of ancient significance. Both attempts of whlch would be admirable, however his arguments are full of holes and the stone does remain a mystery. (I'm not syaing its good or bad that is a mystery - it just is, lets face it). The chief evidence for his argument is the account of the discovery of a similar stone during the digging of a sewer trench in Bennett Drive, Hove in 1955. What he appears to infer is that if you can find a stone similar to the Goldstone while you're digging a sewer, then this undermines the authenticity of the stone. The two obvious questions that this line of argument demands are (a) we know the Goldstone was deliberately buried so couldn't this be an example of the same thing? (b) if this kind of rock does occur naturally in the area does this really preclude its sacred use by the ancients? Of course it doesn't.

Further letters to the Brighton & Hove Herald at this time tend to stick to a discussion of the stone's geology.

Rescued from oblivion: the Goldstone being exhumed by Mr. Hollamby and friends.

In 1792 two men mugged a young postman at the Goldstone Bottom and got away with a half, sovereign. The perpetrators of this crime were not what you'd call big time crooks and within six months they were caught, tried and sentenced to be hung(!) at the spot where they committed the crime. A heavy sentence you may well think, but there's more. Their bodies were gibbetted after the hanging, that is enclosed in an iron frame or chains and left to hang until they fell to pieces on the ground below. The pathetic end to this story is that after the execution at the Goldstone Bottom, the mother of one of the gibbetted men collected the bones of her son as they fell to the ground and took them to be buried at Old Shoreham Churchyard. Tennyson, wrote his poem 'Rizpah' on the subject: "When I cannot see my own hand but am led by the creak of a chain, And grovel and grope for my son till I find myself drenched with rain."

Is it not a wonder that with a cultural heritage like that bearing down on us so many people look depressed on the street?

Two years later the spot was the scene of another savage execution. Soldiers stationed near Seaford were cold, hungry and discontented. In the winter of 1795 they mutinied. Siezing provisions they sold them to the local people at reduced prices. The mutiny was quickly suppressed and after court martial two men were sentenced to be shot and three for flogging. Thousands of soldiers attended at the Goldstone Bottom for the ritual torture and slaughter of these leaders of the mutiny. The three were given three hundred lashes each. The two were shot on their coffins. It was indeed a black day. One of intense suffering and high emotion. The atmosphere was highly charged.

Tamed by suburbia: Goldstone in its modern setting with entrance to the football ground under the trees.

CONCLUSION

What we have simply is a large stone in a park with two plaques before it. One declaring it to be a holy stone of the druids. The other connecting it with masonic groups which are associated with ancient and secret rituals. Next to the stone an oak tree has been planted by the groups - the oak tree had a certain ritual significance for the ancient Saxons. The Nazis in a direct connection with this tradition used the oak leaf cluster as part of their insignia.

We have a mention of a ring of sarsens here in 1824 (by Sicklemore) and a picture which suggests the same. The stone is established in the popular mind as a 'Druid Stone'. Because of its popularity the stone is buried and then dug up and relocated near by. Two double executions took place here. There is a connection between execution places and ancient sites.

As Watkins points out ancient ley markers were often used as Moot points - places of assembly in ancient times for special purposes He says, "These (special purposes) may be divided into five classes - Religion, Administration, Commerce, Recreation." Is it any coincidence that the Brighton and Hove Albion Football ground lies close to where the stone originally was and where the stone now is? Could the Goldstone now be part of the new ley energy system that Colin Bloy refers to (with the excitement and atmosphere generated at a game by tens of thousands of people having some effect on the ley energy)? And if this stone does fit into this new system, then was there any conscious intelligence at work in its relocation?

Plaque to commemmorate the planting of the oak tree at the Goldstones. The smudge over the lower right hand portion of the writing commemmorates a dog's visit to the plaque.

These are questions to which we don't have definite answers. I suggest that competent dowsers might find it interesting to check the place out from time to time. Furthermore, no-one can definitely say whether the Goldstone was sited by men of the megalithic culture or not. However from my researches it seems to me highly likely that it was.

Bibliography :

WATKINS, A. The Old Straight Track
MIDDLETON, J. A History of Hove
SICLEMORE. A History of Brighton.
BLOY, C. An Introduction to Ley Dowsing (Quicksilver Messenger Nos 1 and 2)

HOVE FESTIVAL OF CREATIVE LIVING

The second Hove Festival of Creative Living which took place on 30/31 August at Hove Town Hall was, if measured by the numbers attending, a great success, Organised by the Portland Centre, its structure is similar to the more famous 'Festival of Mind and Body' (held annually at Olympia) and includes exhibitions meditations and lectures. Exhibitors at the festival covered the usual range of alternatives seen at such events which are now taking place all over the country throughout the year: yoga, meditation, wholefoods, ecology, various esoteric philosophies, tarot, acupuncture, astrology - in fact most things which see themselves as part of the New Age Movement. However, I thought that wholefoods for dogs and cats was taking it all a little too far!

In recent years I have noticed some strange additions to the itinery of the New Age Movement as represented in some of the festivals that I've attended. Take for example the maker of swords for ceremonial magic I met at the Aquarian Festival: "This" he told me "is a real fighting sword. 'Ere feel the weight of it. Give someone a shove with that and he'd know all about it:" Then there were the American girls at the Olympia Festival selling Japanese roll up mattresses. "You sleep on it. You roll it up. You store it. You forget about it. It's real firm for your back too. Take this information leaflet. Tell your friends". I'm not quite sure what to make of some of these encounters but perhaps its worth remembering something I heard in a teepee in West Wales some time ago: "One man's Aquarian Age is another man's Piscean." Anyway, my cat won't touch vegetables....

But to return to the Festival of Creative Living. It's popularity is without doubt. And that the public turned up in such large numbers indicates the level of interest that there now is in such subjects. The organisation and promotion (by the Portland Centre who also organise a regular lecture proqramme) of such an event is to be applauded.


IN STRANGEST EUROPE by Ratazzi, Peter: (MITRE, Cloth)

This is a hiqhly unusual and fascinating volume portraying the vanishing face of an unknown old world. After fifteen years' exploration along roads less-travelled-by and winter-time research to follow up, the author has produced a hefty text with information normally hard to find. The scores of artistic photographs back up much that seems astonishing about these places deep in the interior, off the beaten track. Colourful vignettes concern the lives of Czars, Kings, adventurers and revolutionaries. Faust and Frankenstein appear in their historical milieu. Quaint ancient buildings, bizarre statues, sepulchral effigies, an antique planetarium, remote towns, an llth century Jewish cemetery, a marble sarcophaqus producing healing water, runic stones in the Baltic East, monsters, curiosities and rarities, and much more, is seen, from Picardy to Patmos, from Finland to Santiago. A 268-page book to beat the I've been everywhere type of person.

(This review was supplied to us by the author who was unable to supply the name of the reviewer).


THE LEY HUNTER'S COMPANION by Paul Devereaux and Ian Thompson. 1979. Thames and Hudson. (cloth and paper)

'The Ley Hunter's Companion' marks a new stage reached in the story of leys and earth mysteries. This is a carefully researched and well written book by the editors of 'The Ley Hunter'. Divided into two parts, the first gives a complete overview of ley hunting from Watkins first discovery to the exciting work of the Dragon Project. This section deals with the associated phenomena and arguments for and against the ley concept. There are many who would like to see themselves as being scientifically minded people who as part of their fight for truth and rationality, would 'boo-hoo' the concept of leys without even giving them any real consideration. Their line usually goes something like this "We know that ancient man was a nit-wit irrational primitive and any speculation as to him being sophisticated enough to construct ley lines is absolute nonsense." This view is itself irrational, unscientific and prejudiced. As the authors say it comes from people who "seem to operate from a fundamental desire not to believe in leys that would itself provide a psychological study."

Finally, this section has a chapter devoted to guidelines for ley hunting which includes a lot of valuable information as well as being an indication of the authors meticulous approach to the subject.

The second section is a compendium of leys from all over Enqland. This is where field work, map work and library research all come together. And what a wealth of information there is here. To complement the ley maps there are photographs of selected ley points. The text records local history, legend and accounts of strange happenings at the sites.

This book, published just over a year ago, very soon established itself as a basic text for E.M./ley enthusiasts. It's not the sort of book you'd sit down and read from cover to cover but more of a reference work. If you haven't got a copy and you're interested in leys - you'd better get one!

ARTHUR C. CLARKE's MYSTERIOUS WORLD

On Tuesday 2.9.80 the first episode in a series of programmes on strange phenomena was broadcast by I.T.V. The series deals with what it classifies as three different kinds of mysteries. An example of the first kind was given as an eclipse - quite understandable to us but a source of torment in less sophisticated societies, and hence a mystery to them.

In dealing with mysteries of the second kind we were treated to several interviews with obviously quite sane people who had had an experience or who had discovered something which didn't fit into the generally accepted framework of reality; a Belgian pilot's encounter with a great serpent with a horse-like head in the Congo; a family who had seen a sea serpent off the Cornish Coast; Dr. Arne Eggebrecht of Munich who has evidence of the electric cell being in use in Bagdad 2,500 years ago; the giant stone balls of Costa Rica (the largest of which weighs 16 tons and is 8 feet across, all these stone are mathematically precise and yet are made of granite. So far 1500 have been found - who could have made them and for what purpose7) Our own Loch Ness Monster and Cerne Abbas Ciant were included in this section, the latter of which is supposed to enhance human fertility. We don't have complete answer to these mysteries yet only tentative explanation.

For mysteries of the third kind there is no rational explanation. If you've ever wondered how the expression "it's raining cats and dogs' originated then the kind of mysteries classified here as mysteries of the third kind could have the answer: maybe at sometime it actually rained real cats and real dogs! You think this sounds crazy? Well the next group of people interviewed were agin quite normal looking people who were amazed at what they'd experienced : fish falling from the sky in the U.S.A., frogs, beans and nuts falling from a clear sky in England. The last person interviewed stated his experience like this: "How they came and where they came from I don't know. Maybe it was a vortex but where you'd suck up ripe hazel nuts in March I don't know."

Though the programme is fronted by Arthur C. Clarke, John Michelle and Bob Rickard played a hand in its concept and research. The Michelle/Rickard team got together a couple of years ago and put together a "Book of Wonders", which deals specifically with strnage phenomena. Bob Rickard also edits 'Fortean Times', the magazine of strange phenomena (for details see 'Exchange Journals' Section).

All this material deals with the frontiers of reality and if you're interested in getting your consciousness out of the closet this is the stuff for you.

Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World I.T.V. 8.30 Tuesdays
A Book of Wonders - J. Mitchell & B. Rickard Thames & Hudson

For some years there have been reports of a puma or similar member of the big cat family on the prowl in Southern England. This animal has turned up at various times in an area from Norwich to Kent and along the coast to Southampton. Each time the creature has been seen a search has been carried out by the police but it always seems to avoid them.

The creature seen is usually described as cat like in appearance, light in colour with a long tail, 90 cm - 110 cm has been mentioned.

In August/September 1964 the puma was seen over a wide area around Godalming, Surrey. A search was mounted and some tracks were found. A cast was made of these tracks and sent for identification by experts. An intensive search failed to produce an animal to fit the prints. The Puma had eluded police and experts.

Where do these creatures come from? The natural thing to do when an animal such as the one described is reported roaming free would be to check zoos and known private owners. As far as we are aware this has been done and in all cases every animal has been accounted for. Of course this is not to say that an animal has not escaped, perhaps from a private collection, and not been reported for various reasons.

Where the puma comes from, assuming of course that it is a puma, remains a mystery.

Paul Screeton Editor 'Ancient Skills and Wisdom', author 'Quicksilver Heritage': "a fine addition to the field and well worth encouraging."

Sig Lonegren, Editor 'The American Dowser'. I found several of the articles most interesting, I especially found Colin Bloy's article on dowsing for Ley lines most interesting."

Nigel Pennick Editor 'Journal of Geomancy' author Sacred Geomancy' "an excellent magazine which I hope will succeed."

Bob Rickard. Editor 'Fortean Times' author 'Book of Wonders' "you are to be commended on the contents and presentation. From about 7 years experience with F.T., I know neither comes without personal commitment or sheer effort. I wish you a long and successful future."

Brighton and Hove Gazette "Brighton is full of reasonably affluent, ignorant blighters," Mr. Sykes said. "The magazine is too good for them and I doubt if they'l1 buy it."

Aphrodite Bookshop, Hastings "It's too middle class and cosy....something more blood stirring is needed...will the seond issue be of more substance?... Druids are a load of middle class twits."

Magdeline Graham. Editor "Occult World" "Demolishing a few of the wildest theories clears the way for a more level-headed enquiry into Earth Mysteries. We know that they exist and are potent. Now we want to know How and Why. Quicksilver Messenger may help us find out."

Northern Earth Mysteries Newsletter. The litho presentation is very high. The contents are varied, very fascinating, and have a strong Sussex flavour. It is good to see Egerton Sykes supporting this new venture - we wish it every success."

Mrs Janette Jackson, Editor Rilko Newsletter "Congratulations"

Paul Devereaux. Editor 'The Ley Hunter', author 'The Ley Hunters' Companion.' "Excellent"

Southern Evening Echo. "Contains a variety of lively articles".