The Miller's Tomb is placed on the east side of Heydown Hill, a high chalk hill covered with beautiful smooth turf, from about half-way up to the very summit. The tomb stands near a hedge and a group of trees, about two thirds up the hill side. The summit of the hill is conical, and from it there is a complete panoramic view of the surrounding country, bounded on the south by the sea. The miller's windmill stood on this summit, and around it are still visible the remains of an entrenchment which once enclosed a Roman encampment. The miller lived in a cottage at a short distance from his tomb, and this cottage has lately been rebuilt, and is now occupied by his aged sister-in-law and her daughter, Miss Oliver, to whom we are indebted for the following particulars. John Oliver, the miller, was remarkably fond of the spot where the tomb is placed, and with the permission of his landlord, with whom he was on the most friendly terms, he built a summer-house there, and afterwards the tomb, an oblong square, 12 ft. by 6 ft. and 4 ft. high, brick on the sides, stone at the two ends, covered with a stone slab, and surrounded by an iron railing. In the summer-house the miller used to delight to sit and muse on the distant prospect, with his tomb in the foreground; and even after he became blind with age, which was several years before his death, he was led there every day by a little girl who read to him, and acted as his nurse. The tomb was built nearly thirty years before the miller died; and he, as some other men have done, had his coffin made about the same time; he had it placed on castors, and it was nightly wheeled under his bed, and brought out again in the morning. Being in very good circumstances, he left 20l. a year to keep the tomb and the summer-house in repair; but having left the funds which were to produce this sum in the hands of his grand-daughter, though this lady is said to have 300l. a year of her own, yet not one farthing of the 20l. has been expended on the summer-house or the tomb. In consequence of this neglect for upwards of forty-nine years, the summer-house is so completely destroyed, that not even a single brick remains; while the tomb, as will hereafter appear, is in such a state of dilapidation, that the whole of the inscription on it cannot be read. We purposely avoid giving the name of this lady, in the hopes that she will yet do her duty.
