ancient Britons are said to have had were mastiffs, but this must have been many times larger than a mastiff.

REMARKABLE ARCHEOLOGICAL FIND. GOLDEN BOWLS IN BACK GARDEN.

ABOUT a year ago a decorator named Farago, living in one of the poorest slums of Buda Pesth, found, while digging potatoes in his back garden, three large bowls. He believed them to be of brass and his family used them for flowerpots. Subsequently a number of smaller articles, such as rings, chains, and little figures of animals were found in the same garden, and then Farago's curiosity was aroused.

Farago took the smaller pieces to the National Museum of Buda Pesth, where, writes Reuter's correspondent, they were identified as gold ornaments of great beauty and workmanship, dating from the so-called Hallstadt period. He thereupon also took the supposed brass bowls to the Museum, where the Director immediately realised that they constituted one of the most important discoveries of recent times.

The bowls are of pure gold, their workmanship showing their age to be about 2,600 years. The elaborateness of design exceeds by far that of the famous gold treasure found at Szilagysomlyo.

Rumours are now current that the whole neighbourhood abounds in such antiquities. Old Roman pottery, bronze, and gold objects, and even sarcophagi are stated to have been seen lying about in the backyards, and systematic excavations are to be carried out.

MEARE LAKE VILLAGE. EXCAVATION OF BONES AND POTTERY.

IN marked contrast to last season, the Meare Lake Village excavations have been in progress this summer for three weeks without any hindrance caused by bad weather.

Dr. A. Bulleid and Mr. H. St. George Gray, directing the work on behalf of the Somersetshire Archæological and Natural History Society, have been able to make good progress, and their efforts have, on the whole, been well rewarded. The work was finished for the season on Saturday and the filling-in is now being carried out. The site which has been systematically examined is in

continuation of excavations previously made, and includes a very large dwelling-mound which, before disturbance, was at its highest part just over five feet above the field, which is but 13 feet above the mean tide-level at Highbridge, nearly ten miles distant. Good examples of the timber substructure and brushwood resting on the natural peat have been uncovered this season, revealing trunks and planks of oak, alder, willow, and silver birch. Several mortised. beams were noted, but they were probably not in their original position. In the substructure, a small though well preserved piece of wattle work was uncovered the remains of a hut-wall lying horizontally across some timber. In the foundations and on some of the floors cereals were collected, and a large number of small beans and sloe stones; also small pieces of carbonized food, or “bread.”

In the same positions slingstones have been found abundantly, two of the hoards or collections consisting of 510 and 278 pebbles respectively. Several sling-bullets of baked clay were found in addition. A few saddle querns have been uncovered and two pieces of the rotary quern, which, as a type, is, of course, rather later. Whetstones have been plentiful especially in Mound XXIV., -a typical dwelling-site some 25 feet in diameter, surrounded by the remains of piles representing the wall-posts. This mound has been extremely interesting and has produced the majority of the relics found this season. Structually, perhaps the chief feature was the series of twelve superimposed hearths of clay, very clearly defined, the largest being fully 4 feet in diameter.

In this dwelling a good deal of iron was found, much of it very fragmentary and corroded, indicating a smelting-place. The iron objects included a spearhead, a large copper ring, and a bar (not yet cleaned). In bronze, there are two large spiral fingerrings quite complete, two smaller rings, rivet-heads, and bordering. In lead and tin a spiral ring and a net-sinker have been unearthed. The antler objects include combs (of which there are now over 70 in the collection), “cheek-pieces," and handles. In bone there have been found two needles, some cut shoulder-blades, and several worked bones. There are a number of spindle whorls and flint implements. The objects of Kimmeridge shale include an armlet, part of another (the material just over an inch in width), and two harness-rings.

But perhaps the most striking class of "finds" discovered this season is included under the heading of pottery. The proportion

of ornamented fragments is very high, and a great many new and highly ornate designs have been added to the collection. Some of the shapes are also new, and it will be possible to restore several of the ornamented pots. Several bases of pots are incised with bisecting arcs and other designs. One perfect pot, of graceful outline but unornamented, was found on the first day on the outskirts of the marsh village, just below the flood-soil, which is lathe-turned, and belongs to the first century A.D. Another pot

of late Celtic design, of which all the pieces have been found, will, when restored, be a bowl or porringer, four inches in height.

No human remains have been unearthed this season, but animal bones, especially of young animals, have been very plentiful, the ox and sheep predominating; pig is fairly abundant, but horse is rather scarce. All these animals are somewhat smaller than their representatives at the present day. The Times.

Reviews of Books.

BY THE EDITOR.

OLD ENGLISH HOUSEHOLD LIFE. SOME ACCOUNT OF COTTAGE OBJECTS AND COUNTRY FOLK. By GERTRUDE JEKYLL. (B. T. Batsford, Ltd. 1925.) 21s. net.

THE charm of English country life is felt by all English folk, whether it be their misfortune to dwell in the crowded streets of industrial town or amidst the fields and lanes of rural villages. On the principle that we always begin to value most that of which we have been deprived, perhaps the townsman cherishes the memory of his former country home more than rustics who still inhabit our country cottages. Villagers sometimes consider their lives dull and dreary, and flock to the towns as to an Eldorado, whose streets are paved with gold; and then, when they have found a cottage in a city street closely environed by vociferous neighbours, elbowed in on every side, with no garden in which they can grow flowers and vegetables, no place for their children to play in save the dirty and dangerous thoroughfare, they begin to sigh for their former pleasant homes, and wish themselves back again in the sweet country where the birds sang for them and the roses bloomed and scattered sweet scents which were far preferable to the petrol laden air and of the dusty town roads.

Indeed country life has an engrained attraction for the English race, and in spite of the thrall of commercialism, this tendency continues to show itself, especially at abnormal times such as those in the recent war. Lord Birkenhead, in singing the praise of his family, the Smiths, said that "the Smiths are a virile race; they come straight from the anvil"; and our country folk are a virile race, too. They come from the farm and the fold, the moors and the downs with the springing turf under one's feet, and far extending

views over vale and hill and streams and rivers; and though they migrate to the towns and become absorbed in the crowds, they love to trace their rural origins, look back with longing to the country side, and cherish the wish to end their days in its retirement. And

if these denizens in crowded cities read this book by the lady, Miss Jekyll, who is so great an authority on country life, that longing will be intensified.

But the country has greatly changed. Old ways and manners have passed away, old industries that employed the members of a family in the dark winter evenings and brought grist to the mill have been forgotten. Ancient cottages have been pulled down and given place to "Council Cottages" which are neither graceful nor beautiful, though they do afford increased accommodation. for a growing family, and have a bathroom, and a bath which makes a good receptacle for coals. Miss Jekyll mourns, too, in less remote villages the passing away of the old grace and kindliness of speech and manner. Her book comes opportunely. It affords a written remembrance of the older and, in many respects, better ways that are within the memory of people still living. It is valuable, and should be increasingly valuable as the age passes, and our grandchildren may want to know how English folk lived in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

The author of this book is certainly the proper writer to have been chosen for the undertaking. Some of us may remember her interesting book on "Old West Surrey," which the present writer is happy to possess, and he has often examined Miss Jekyll's valuable collection of old household goods, implements, and cottage furniture, stored in the Guildford Museum at the entrance to the Castle. In this book she has extended her review to other counties, though the Home Counties are the chief field for her research. Others have followed in her steps and formed similar collections. In county museums, such as Colchester, Norwich, Reading and elsewhere, sections are devoted to these rustic objects; so that it is now increasingly difficult to amass rushlight holders, candlesticks, fire-dogs, warming pans, and the hundreds of other objects in the possession of which our forefathers took delight. But excellent illustrations of all these are found in Miss Jekyll's book, many of which are reproduced from her own photographs.

Her book begins with the evolution of the fireplace, tracing its descent from the central fire in the lord's hall, to the comfortable inglenook, the fire backs, dog-grates, ovens, etc. The lighting of