Box, a village and a parish in Wilts. the village stands on the Box river and G.W.R., 102 miles from London, and 5 NW by W of Bath, and has a station on the railway, and a post, money order, and telegraph office under Chippenham. It contains numerous old houses, and is supposed to occupy the site of Roman baths. Numerous relics have been found in the vicinity, including a Roman pavement and other remains. About a mile from the village there is a very curious little chapel or shrine, which used to be the resting-place for pilgrims on their way to Glastonbury, with a great deal of 15th century work about it. In the centre of the parish there is a handsome fountain. The parish includes also the hamlets of Wadswick, Box-Quarries, Ashley, Kingsdown, Washwell, and Middle-Hill, and the manor of Hazelbury. Acreage, 4647 ; population of the civil parish, 2360 ; of the ecclesiastical, 2236. The surface is a picturesque assemblage of hill and dale. Box Hill has three curious quarries of bath-stone, one of them subterranean. Box Tunnel, in the course of the railway, is 3195 yards long and in some parts 300 feet below the surface, and was formed at a cost of £500,000. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Gloucester and Bristol; gross value, £408. The church is variously Early English, Decorated, and Perpendicular, with central tower and spire. There are Free Methodist and Wesleyan chapels, and a cemetery occupying about an acre, with a pretty mortuary chapel. There are extensive stone quarries, and some brewing and mailing are done.
