That troubled period in our annals, when the two great parties of modern times took their origin, must always have a living interest for Englishmen. One truth of this is prominently brought before us in the dedication of this book, for it is inscribed to the Earl of Carnarvon, who is a leader of the Conservative party, and also represents ancestors who took a prominent part in the great Civil War. Here, however, is one of the main difficulties in the way of our getting true history, for writers are too apt to fight the battles of to-day when relating the battles of the past. Mr. Money very justly complains that the subject of his

book has not hitherto been treated with due attention

to its importance. There is some excuse for the historian of a long period, as it is hardly possible for him to visit all the localities about which he writes. Mr. Money has this special knowledge. He writes: "Born under the shadow of the grey walls of Donnington Castle, near which my ancestors dwelt, during the occurrences of these stirring events, I have naturally felt a special interest in anything that concerns the varied fortunes and associations of the old fortress, which figures so prominently in these local, but at the same time national, transactions." The result of this natural interest has been that the author has produced a book which is a definite addition to our knowledge of the two battles of Newbury. Each battle is fully described, and is illustrated with a plan of the position of the troops, and in the appendixes we have fuller accounts of the details, biographical notices of the officers, lists of the sequestrators of the estates of "Delinquents, Papists, Spyes, and Intelligencers for the county of Berks. The book is fully illustrated with photographic copies of portraits of the chief men on both sides of the memorable struggle.

Chronicles and Stories of the Craven Dales. By. J. H. DIXON, LL.D.; with an introduction by the Rev. ROBERT COLLYER, of New York. (London: Simpkin, Marshall & Co. Skipton: Edmondston & Co., 1881.) Sm. 8vo, pp. xiii.-472.

Dr. Dixon's Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England has long been known to all lovers of ballad literature as a most delightful work of one who wrote too little. The author had the somewhat rare power of gathering up oral traditions overlooked by others. These chronicles and stories were originally contributed to a monthly magazine, published at Skipton, and Messrs. Edmonston deserve our thanks for issuing them in a book form, so that they may have a more extended circulation. Legends and traditions of this beautiful district of Yorkshire are interspersed with anecdotes of celebrated men. One of them is interesting as connecting Craven Buildings, Drury Lane, with the Craven dales. William Craven, of Appletreewick, was a pauper lad,

and took the name of the district from which he came. His journey to London was a successful one, and in due course he became Lord Mayor, and was knighted. He was a worthy, and did not forget his origin. In 1612 he repaired and beautified the old parish church, an event which was recorded in the following remarkable verses:

"This church of beauty, most repaired, thus so bright, Two hundred pounds did coste Sir William Craven, Knight.

Many other works of charitie, whereof no mention here,

True tokens of his bountie in this parish did appeare. The place of his nativitie in Appletreewick is seene, And late of London citie, Lord Mayor he hath beene. The care of this work, so beautiful and faire,

Was put to John Topham, clerk, by the late Lord Mayor

Of that famous citie of London so brighte,
By Sir William Craven, that bountiful Knighte.
Borne in this parish at Appletreewick towne,
Who regarded no coste, so the work was well done."
It is said that instead of £200 Sir William actually
expended £600, but this sum included the building of
the churchyard wall and the erection of the wick-gate.
The son of the old tradesman entered the army, and
in due course was created Baron of Hampstead
Marshal, and Earl of Craven, and is supposed to have
married the unfortunate Queen of Bohemia, sister of
Charles I., whose cause he had warmly espoused.
The memory of his fine old house in Drury Lane is
kept alive by the name of Craven Buildings. Through
a certain topographical connection we are led from
the Craven family to Eugene Aram. Sir William
Craven erected and endowed the Grammar School at
Burnsall, and in that school the famous murderer was
once an usher. The anecdotes of celebrated men are
linked on to relics of folk-lore in a way that we can-
not do more than indicate in a short notice. There
is a curious account of the Rev. Benjamin Smith, B.D.,
a half-nephew of Sir Isaac Newton, and Rector of
Linton. The Grammar School at Peresfield Wharfe
was haunted by a goblin named "Old Pam." Mr.
Smith was in the habit of writing his sermons in the
schoolroom, and on one occasion he was soundly
cuffed by "Old Pam" in the dark. In revenge Mr.
Smith left some brandy on the master's desk, the bait
took, and next time he visited the school "Pam" was
discovered in a drunken state and fiercely attacked. He
was said to have been killed outright, but anyway he
came to life again, and is said still to haunt the place.
Dr. Dixon died on the 26th of October, 1876, and his
book was abruptly concluded. The Rev. Robert
Collyer, of New York, gives his recollections of the
author, and adds some amusing anecdotes of his own-
as that of the Craven Clerk who commemorated the
Bishop's visitation with a new version of the Psalm-

"Ye little hills why do ye skip,
And wherefore do ye hop?
Is it because that ye have come
To see my Lord Bishop?"

The Poems of Master Francis Villon, of Paris, now first done into English Verse in the Original Forms, by JOHN PAYNE, author of "The Masque of Shadows," "Intaglios," "Songs of Life and Death," "Lautrec," "New Poems," &c. (London: Reeves & Turner. 1881.) Small Svo, pp. xcvi.-150.

It has become a byword that genius is erratic, but although many authors have been bohemians it is not often that we have to seek a true poet among the dangerous classes. Villon was something more than a bohemian, for he was a leader among a gang of thieves. Although his reputation as a citizen must have been very low, his reputation as a poet has always stood high. He was born in 1431, and before 1542 more than twenty-seven editions of his poems were published. Clement Marot calls him "Le premier poète Parisien," and Francis I. knew him by heart. Little was known of the personal history of Villon until the year 1877, when Mons. Longnon published his "Étude Biographique," but now there are sufficient details and hints to allow of Mr. Payne's writing a valuable and tolerably full account of the poet's doings. Still Mr. Payne regrets that there is not more to tell, The facts are shortly these : François de Montcorbier was born, as before stated, in 1431, probably at some village near Paris; little more is known of his parents than that his father died when he was young, and that his mother suffered "bitter anguish and many sorrows" on account of his turbulent career. The name by which he is known was that of his patron, Guillaume de Villon, a respectable ecclesiastic, who apparently adopted him at an early age. He entered the University of Paris about 1446, and was admitted to the Baccalaureate in March 1450, and became Licentiate in Theology, of Ecclesiastical Law, and Master of Arts in the summer of 1452. From this time until 1455, when he had to fly, in consequence of having killed a man in a brawl, nothing is known of his history. After this his career of crime commenced, he passed his time in the company of the thieves and vagabonds who infested the neighbourhood of Paris, and became a leader among them. In 1456 he wrote his Lesser Testament, in which the names of some of these more than doubtful characters are registered. In 1461 he was arrested for a crime said to have been the theft of a lamp from the parish church of Baccon, near Orleans, and condemned to death. He suffered much in a horrible dungeon, but was released when Louis XI. came to the throne. At the age of thirty, when he wrote his Greater Testament, his debaucheries had told upon his constitution to such an extent that his life was of little value to him, and as nothing is heard of him after 1461 it is supposed that he must have died about that time. Mr. Payne's introduction, which contains these particulars and more, gives a striking and valuable picture of the disjointed state of society in France when that country was being consolidated. That Villon was a true poet no one who reads a page of his writing can doubt. There is a strength and directness in every line that contrasts remarkably with the ordinary writing of his time, and his associates are gibbeted in his two Testaments with considerable impartiality. Mr. Payne is so well known as a master in poetry that it goes without saying that

he has done justice to his original, but he has done more than this. He has so thoroughly entered into its spirit that we read on without feeling that we have a translation before us. Although the love of his mother and the never failing-kindness of his patron were not sufficient to draw Villon from his evil courses, his heart was not so dead as to forget them; of the first of them he writes in his Greater Testument :

"I give the ballad following

To my good mother,-who of me
(God knows!) hath had much suffering,—
That she may worship our Ladie:
No other refuge can I see

To which, when stricken down by dole,
I may for help and comfort flee;
Nor yet my mother, poor good soul !"
Of the patron we read :-

"Item, to Guillaume de Villon,-

My more than father, who indeed
To me more love and care hath done
Than mothers to the babes they feed;
Who me for many a scrape hath freed,
And now of me hath small liesse,

I do intreat him, bended-kneed,
He seek not now to share my stress."

We cannot give any adequate idea of Villon's genius from quotations, and our readers must go to the book itself, but may just allude to a powerful picture of a churchyard, where high and low, rich and poor, are laid, which commences thus :-

"Here silence doth for ever reign:
Nothing it profiteth the dead

On beds of satin to have lain

And drank from gold the vine-juice red
And lived in glee and lustihead.
Soon all such joys must be resigned:
All pass away, and in their stead
Only the sin remains behind."

Mr. Payne was well-advised when he decided to appeal to a larger circle of readers than that for which he prepared the limited issue of 1878, for we cannot doubt but that many will wish to possess this dainty volume.

Meetings of Antiquarian Societies.

METROPOLITA N.

SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES.-May 12, EARL OF CARNARVON, President, in the Chair.- Mr. Cheales exhibited tracings of some wall-paintings at Friskney Church in Lincolnshire.-Mr. Park Harrison exhibited a slate tablet, found in a shingle house at Towyn among other ancient remains, covered with scribblings, which appear to represent urns, hatchets, baskets, and other utensils, and, Mr. Harrison suggested, might be the inventory of someone's property. Mr. Clements Markham exhibited a silver tazza from Arlington Church.

May 19.-Mr. W. C. BORLASE, M.P., Vice-Presi dent, in the Chair.-Lord Arundel of Wardour exhibited a charter of William de Briwere, in the reign of King John, bearing a seal with a design of a merwoman suckling a merchild.-Mr. Rivett Carnac exhibited a collection of spindle-whorls and votive seals found in Buddhist ruins in North-west India.-Mr. R. S. Ferguson exhibited a fine specimen of a British Bronze torque found at Carlisle.-Mr. Myddleton read a Paper upon the Coptic churches in Old Cairo, illustrated by plans of the church of Abou Serget.

ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE.-Tuesday, May 24.-Major-Gen. A. Pitt-Rivers, F.R.S., President, in the Chair. Mr. E. H. Man read a Paper on "The Arts of the Andamanese and Nicobarese." He stated that they are divided into at least nine tribes, linguistically distinguished, and in most, if not all, of these there are two distinct sections-viz., inland and coast men. In many mental characteristics affinity to the Papuans would appear to exist; and the standard in social and marital relations is shown to be far higher than could be expected from a race so entirely outside the pale of civilization. The previous accounts of their laxity in this respect are now proved to be erroneous. They have no forms of religion, or ideas of worship; and, though they have faith in a Supreme Being, the Creator, their belief in the Powers of Evil is much more strongly developed. The habitations of the eight tribes of Great Andaman are of three varieties, partaking almost invariably of the nature of a simple lean-to; while those of the remaining tribe, Jarawa-(da), are somewhat similar in form to the huts erected by the Nicobarese. The rights of private property are recognized and respected; there also appears to be a fair division of labour, and perfect equality between the sexes in their social intercourse.-Dr. Allen Thompson, F.R.S., read a paper on "Some Bone Necklaces from the Andaman Islands." Several of the specimens exhibited were constructed entirely of human bones, while some were composed of bones of various animals, and others were partly made up of pieces of coral.-Mr. J. Park Harrison, hibited an incised slate tablet and other objects from Towyn.

ex

ARCHEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE. June 2.-Lord Talbot de Malahide, President, in the Chair. The Rev. W. J. Loftie read some notes on 66 Recent Discoveries among the Egyptian Pyramids." Mr. J. Park Harrison read a paper on "Incised Figures upon Slate, and other Remains, from Towyn, Merionethshire."-Capt. E. Hoare read a Paper on some early tiles from Stanhoe and the ruined church of Barwickin-the-Brakes, Norfolk.-Mr. W. Thompson Watkin sent a Paper on "Roman Inscriptions Discovered in Britain in 1880." This is Mr. Watkin's eighth supplement to Dr. Hübner's volume of Britanno-Roman inscriptions, and his fifth annual list.-Mr. J. H. Parker called attention to some photographs of a remarkable series of wood-carvings in the church of Trull, near Taunton, dated 1560, which represent ecclesiastical dignitaries and officials in "unreformed vestments.Mr. W. Gain exhibited a plan and contributed notes on earthworks at Laxton and Egmanton, Notts.-Mr. Loftie exhibited a very fine series of scarabs, bearing kings' names.-Mr. Harrison sent a collection of antiquities, some as late as the seventeenth century,

from Towyn.—Mr. Watkin exhibited a photograph of the great statue found last year at York, and gave reasons in his Paper for suggesting that Britannia may be here represented.-Mr. G. Joslin laid before the meeting a rubbing from the inscribed Roman altar lately found at Colchester.-The Rev. A. Porter produced a fine Roman cameo, an Indian sardonyx, found in the late Mr. Davis's garden at York, and representing a youthful fawn.-Mr. O. Morgan exhibited a drawing of a beautiful Roman tessellated pavement lately uncovered at Caerwent, and drew attention to its remarkable characteristics of the various fish of the district being represented upon it, the salmon and the eel being very apparent. Mr. Morgan also exhibited a couteau de chasse of the unusual length of nineteen inches, apparently of the sixteenth century.-Mr. F. Rudler sent a human vertebra with a flint arrow-head embedded in it. This highly interesting relic was found by Mr. Madge in a burial-mound near Copiapo, Chili.

BRITISH ARCHEOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION.-May 18. -The Rev. S. M. Mayhew in the Chair.-The further discovery of Roman articles in King's Arms Yard was announced by Mr. R. E. Way.-An ecclesiastical seal was exhibited by Mr. W. S. Smith.-Mr. L. Brock described a mould for casting pilgrims' signs recently found in Liquorpond Street.-The Chairman exhibited two remarkable figures in oak found in London, and several other objects of Saxon and later dates.-Mr. C. Sherborn described a dagger which, from its inscription, was one of those used by the twenty-five men who banded themselves together to avenge the murder of Sir E. Godfrey in 1678.-Mr. W. Myers exhibited a large collection of antiquarian objects. Among these were a gold zerf from Zanzibar, a gold statue of Bramah, some Irish ring money, a fine series of Egyptian articles, worked cones from Cissbury, and many flint instruments from Thebes and from Gourna in the desert.-A Paper was then read by Dr. Rhine on certain figures of wood, confessedly of remote antiquity, which have been found in Britain, Brittany, &c., at various periods.

June 1.-Earl Nelson in the Chair. Mr. R. Blair described further discoveries at the Roman station, South Shields, and the Rev. Dr. Hooppell an inscribed tile found at Lincoln.-Mrs. R. Clay exhibited a gold beetle from Yucatan, said to live to a fabulous age.-Mr. Loftus Brock exhibited a great number of Greek and Asiatic headless penates in illustration of the custom still prevalent of destroying the heads when discovered, to preserve the finders, as they suppose, from the evil eye. Mr. H. Prigg described a Roman ring with an intaglio found at Bury St. Edmunds.-Mr. J. Brett reported the discovery of other Roman articles at Canterbury, some of which were exhibited.-The Rev. S. M. Mayhew described a fine collection of glass vessels illustrative of the manufacture of that material from comparatively recent times backwards to a remote period. Mr. H. Syer Cuming described a Saxon stone cross recently found during some repairs at Bolton Church, Lancashire.-A Paper was then read by Mr. Cuming on the representation of mermaids in various mediæval works.

LONDON AND MIDDLESEX ARCHEOLOGICAL SOCIETY.-Annual Meeting.-June 22.-The meeting

was held in the Council Chamber, Guildhall, the Right Hon. William McArthur, M.P., Lord Mayor, in the Chair. Some remarks were read by Mr. Alderman Hanson, upon "Sir William Ashurst, Lord Mayor, 1694.' Notes on some of the Paintings and sculpture belonging to the Corporation, were given by Mr. J. R. Dicksee, curator of works of art to the Corporation. The civic regalia were shown, and some account was given of their antiquity, by Mr. Benjamin Scott. The charters and early records of the Corporation were exhibited and explained by Sir John B. Monckton, town clerk. Early examples of public and private seals from the time of Fitz Ailwyn, the first Lord Mayor in the reign of Richard I., 1189, were shown by Mr. J. A. Brand, Comptroller. The company then proceeded to the old Exchequer Court, the Guildhall, and the Crypt; some of the most interesting features of the Hall, the restoration of the roof, &c., were explained by Mr. Horace Jones. The Library and Museum were next visited; an account of the former and its contents was read by Mr. W. H. Overall,

NUMISMATIC.-May 19.-Mr. J. Evans, D.C.L., President, in the Chair.-Mr. A. Grant exhibited four tetradrachms, a drachm, and a hemidrachm of Hellocles, King of Bactria; also five copper coins of the Sakas.-Mr. Durlacher exhibited a set of the different types of Queen Anne's farthings.-The Rev. C. Soames exhibited three small silver ancient British coins and one copper.-Mr. Krumbholz exhibited seventeen silver pennies of Edward the Confessor, of various types, mints, and moneyers.-Mr. H. S. Gill read a Paper on some seventeenth century tokens of Devonshire.-M. H. Sauvaire communicated an article on an inedited fels of a prince of Sejestân of the second branch of the Saffaride family. PHILOLOGICAL.-May 20.-Anniversary Meeting. Mr. A. J. Ellis, President, in the Chair.-The President read his annual address, principally on spelling reform.

Friday, June 3.-Mr. A. J. Ellis, President, in the chair. The Paper read was "History of English Sounds, Part III., with Some Etymologies," by Mr. H. Sweet.

ROYAL SOCIETY OF LITERATURE.-Wednesday, May 25.-Mr. Charles Clark, Q.C., in the Chair. Mr. C. Pfoundes read a Paper on "The Popular Literature of Old Japan," in which he gave an account of the ancient classical, poetical, middle-age, and modern literature of Japan, with the romances, folklore, and dramas, &c., current in that country. A number of specimens of Japanese books and drawings were exhibited, as well as photographs, in illustration of various Japanese customs.

SOCIETY OF BIBLICAL ARCHEOLOGY.-June 7.Dr. S. Birch, President, in the chair. Mr. Theo. G. Pinches read some remarks upon the recent discoveries of Mr. Rassam at Aboo-habba.-The President communicated some notes on the recently discovered Pyramid of Pepi (Sixth Dynasty) at Sakkara.-A Paper from Prof. E. L. Lushington, "On the Stèle of Mentuhotep," was read. A communication was read from Mr. H. H. Howorth, "Was Piankhi a Synonym for Sabako?"

ST. PAUL'S ECCLESIOLOGICAL SOCIETY.-June 11. The members of this society visited Berkhamp.

stead and were received by the rector, the Rev. J. W. Cobb, and by Canon Owen W. Davys, the latter of whom read an interesting Paper on the Church, in which he described the fine cruciform edifice, its features and monuments, and denounced the manner in which it is now being restored. The Grammar School, a Tudor structure of brick, was next seen, under the guidance of the head-master, the Rev. E. Bartram. It was built in 1541-2 by Dr. John Quent, Principal of St. John's Brotherhood, Berkhampstead, and Dean of St. Paul's, London, on the site of the Brotherhood's house. The members afterwards visited Northchurch St. Mary, a small cruciform church about a mile from Berkhampstead, having the high deal pews, the west gallery, and a lath-and-plaster partition shutting off the east-end as a vestry, but about to be restored. The ruins of Berkhampstead Castle were next seen. They are now reduced to shapeless masses of masonry, and an artificial mount and traces of a bailey surrounded by walls, outer walls, vallum, rampart, and

moat.

PROVINCIAL.

SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF SCOTLAND. May 9.-Professor Duns, D.D., Vice-President, in the Chair.-Mr. W. Jolly read a Paper on some cupmarked stones in the neighbourhood of Inverness. They are all found on the south shores of the Moray. Firth, within a radius of twenty miles of Inverness. The carvings are generally of the simplest type—viz., plain shallow cups of varying size, sometimes surrounded by single rings, and occasionally with con necting gutters. Some are connected with larger hollow basons carved in the stone. They are mostly on sandstone, but occasionally in harder and unstratified stones. The number of cups on single stones varies from one to one hundred and thirteen. They occur on stones connected with standing circles and with chambered cairns, and on separate monoliths; and for the first time in Scotland these sculpturings have been discovered in connection with churchyards, in which they have been utilized for monuments and gravestones. Mr. Jolly described with great minuteness of detail a large number of cup-marked stones which are associated with chambered cairns at Clava, Culbirnie, and Corriemony; a still larger number associated with stone circles, or carved on the stones composing the circle, examples of which occur at Gask and Tordarroch in Strathnairn, at Kiltarlity, near Beauly, &c. At Little Urchany, near Cawdor, Mr. Jolly found several cup-markings on a granite monolith forming one of the stones of a circle. Many were found on isolated stones. The largest of these is a stone called Clachmore, at Culnakirk, Glen Urquhart. It is 16 feet long, above 9 feet broad, with an average thickness of I foot, and has on its upper surface no fewer than 113 cups, 20 of which are from 24 to 44 inches diameter, and from inch to 1 inch in depth, many of them being united by distinct grooves. Other stones similarly marked, though the markings are fewer in number, were described from Clava, Moniack Castle, and at Kirkton, Bunchrew, which had been brought from Rhynie, Aberdeenshire. The most remarkable fact ascertained by Mr. Jolly was the occurrence of these cup-marked stones in several of the churchyards of the district, as in the old church

yard of Barevan, at Cawdor; in Braeclich churchyard, near Fort George Station; in the churchyard of Dunlichity, and in that of Glenconvinth, near Beauly. Other cupped stones, like St. Columba's font at Abriochan, seemed to have been originally ecclesiastical, and one at Dunlichity was used within the memory of persons living as a baptismal font. Drawings of no fewer than 65 stones of these various classes were exhibited. In connection with Mr. Jolly's Paper, the Rev. Dr. Joass, of Golspie, sent for exhibition to the meeting a cast of a cup-marked stone recently found at Dunrobin, and stated that he only knew of five such stones in Sutherland. Professor Duns read a notice of stone implements from Shetland, some of which were found on the site of an early settlement adjacent to the church and manse of Maill, Cuningsburgh, by Rev. George Clerk. A large and beautifully-finished celt, found at the opening of a quarry in that_neighbourhood, was also exhibited and described.-The Chairman also read a communication from Captain W. Gillon, describing a pair of iron shears and a hone-stone which he had found on the site of the crannog at Lochlea, near Kilmarnock, and which he presented to the national collection. He also described a polished celt found in the Burn of Need, parish of Sorn, Ayrshire, and presented to the national collection by Mr. James Gall through Captain Gillon.

BATLEY ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY.-May 28.-The Society paid a visit to Thornhill Church, for the purpose of inspecting the many objects of antiquity in and about the church and grounds. They were received by the Rev. Mr. Greenside, the curate, who conducted them through the church, and rectory grounds, and explained to them the various objects of interest. The visitors were most interested in the Savile Chapel, which has been the burial-place of the Saviles for more than four centuries. The three stones in the rectory grounds, with Roman inscriptions, were viewed with some interest. It has been ascertained that two of these stones are the work of the sixth to the ninth centuries, and the other of the ninth century, and they were all in a good state of preservation.

CAMBRIDGE ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY.-May 16.— Prof. Hughes, F.S.A., President, in the Chair.-Mr. Jenkinson gave a preliminary notice of excavations in the Roman and Saxon Cemetery at Girton College, and exhibited specimens of the objects discovered. The Saxon remains consisted chiefly of sepulchral urns. In the urns were found burnt human bones, with fibule, beads, &c., much injured by fire, and bone combs, or pieces of comb, which, as well as the bronze tweezers which sometimes occurred with them, showed no signs of burning. A layer of stones often covered the graves; and the rectangular outline of many of these stones, as well as the fact that they were oölite, and must have been brought from a distance, suggested that some Roman building had furnished the materials; and a mass of cement with a Roman brick imbedded in it, which lay at the head of one grave, gave further confirmation of this theory. The urns were often covered with pieces of similar stone, and occasionally with a piece of Roman tile. The Roman remains were almost all found in two square chambers, which appear to have been buried boxes,

the nails, and portions of the wood adjacent to them, marking the outline clearly enough. - Dr. Pearson exhibited to the Society a view of the earthen rampart or lines of Perekop, at the Isthmus leading into the Crimea, taken from Pallas's Travels in Southern Russia. It was shown as a salient example of the ancient dykes, one of which was ascribed to Offa, King of the Mercians.

May 30.-Annual Meeting.-Prof. Hughes, F.S.A.. in the Chair.-A communication was read from Sir P. Colquhoun on the true site of Dodona.-Mr. Browning made a communication on a Keltiberian inscription. When visiting the theatre of Saguntum on April 16, 1881, Mr. Browning found, imbedded in the proscenium, a number of stone tablets, with Roman inscriptions; among them was a stone, carved carefully and exactly with strange characters. Prof. Sayce wrote from Oxford that the inscription is in the character of the so-called Keltiberian alphabet, only partially deciphered as yet by the help of a few bilingual coins, and he gave a reading of the inscription according to the alphabet at present accepted.-Mr. W. B. Redfarn exhibited and described a collection of medieval spurs, a fifteenth century solleret, "à la poulaine,” for the left foot; three stirrups in chased and perforated iron, probably for a mule, sixteenth century, and a curious antique horseshoe recently dug up near Park Side. Mr. O. Browning exhibited and described a sixteenth century Italian spur, from Scurgola.-Mr. Beck exhibited and described four specimens of copper ring-money, used by the Liverpool merchants in trading with the natives on the West Coast of Africa; sixteen silver-gilt studs of Gothic work, forming parts of various medieval belts worn in Iceland; three antique silver-gilt filagree ball pendants, from which are suspended representations of the Crucifixion and of St. George and the Dragon. -Mr. Bidwell exhibited a red Romano-British terra cotta vase, and a fragment of a patera in Samian ware, and of a mortarium, all which had lately been found in St. Mary's parish, Ely, about one mile north-west from the Cathedral, and at the depth of one foot below the surface.

ISLE OF MAN NATURAL HISTORY AND ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY.-April 5.-The_Rev. William Kermode in the Chair.-The Rev. E. B. Savage read the Paper on "Notes on the Parish Register of Kirk Michael, Isle of Man." The registers of Kirk Michael begin with the year 1610, but the first entry is a transcript from the original, explained by the following note at the beginning:-"The old Register Book being abused in the Parliament's time was forced to be transcribed and ye same being written on bad paper severall names have been lost and as many as were legible are transcribed in this Book which was bought upon ye parish charge by ye wardens and the vicar. Mr. Norris then in being in ye year of our Lord God 1712. Price Loo 07s. ood." Curiously enough, the baptisms continue yearly "in the Parliament's time," though sadly fallen off in numbers; but the burials register is an entire blank from 1653 to 1663. The marriages continue regularly from 1656; but, as a sign of disturbed times, we find against 1658 "none maryd," and only three couples in 1659, and those all between the 16th and 22nd of November. Much interesting in