During the comparatively brief period of its existence references to the chapel of our Lady of the Pew are not uncommon. But so quickly did its memory perish that John Stow writing some sixty years after its disuse was at first hopelessly in error as to its position. In the original edition of his Survey of London he connected it with the house of Bethlehem Hospital by Charing Cross. This error was corrected in the second edition, where our Lady of the Pew is described as a smaller chapel, which was sometime by the chapel of St. Stephen in the Palace of Westminster. Even when the more part of the history of the Pew was accurately brought together in J. T. Smith's Antiquities of Westminster, the author so little appreciated the character of the chapel, that after remarking ‘No etymology of the term le Pew has as yet been attempted’, he went on to allege: ‘no difficulty in settling it will remain when it is remembered that the French substantive Putts means a well, and known that in or about the Palace of Westminster were no fewer than four wells still remaining.’

Permit me through your hands to lay the enclosed papers before the Society of Antiquaries, concerning an ancient custom of setting up Posts, which were occasionally to be new painted, on each side of the gates of Chief Magistrates of cities. The accompanying drawings (see Pl. XXXVI.) are taken from different houses in Elmhill near the Tomb-land, Norwich. The posts of fig. 1 are the most ancient, and are in the style which prevailed about the reign of Henry VIIIth; they are covered with red paint.

I have the pleasure to exhibit to the Society a curious Gimmal or Gemmow Ring; which was dug up, a few months ago, by the workmen employed on some buildings belonging to George Shepley Esq. at Horsley-down, in Surrey. It was discovered about eight or nine seet below the surface of the earth, in what is called made-ground, but which appeared to have lain undisturbed for a considerable length of time. Other rings, and many ancient copper coins and medals, both Roman and English, were found near the same spot; as were the skeletons of several human bodies.

The ‘Esquiline Treasure’ is one of the prize exhibits in the British Museum; two small objects from it are to be found in Paris and Naples. A contemporary account of its discovery in 1793 was published by the leading antiquarian of the day, Ennio Quirinio Visconti. He described the operation as a chance excavation near the monastery of the Minims on the Esquiline with a further footnote specifying that the site was a little beyond the Subura in the remains of some ancient rooms of good construction but filled later with ruins.

A few months ago the catalogue of an auction sale in Shropshire contained an entry of a manuscript, believed to be of the fifteenth century, relating to Herefordshire. Upon inspection it was established that this was an imperfect rent roll, probably of the steward of a bishop of the see of Hereford. Unfortunately as the caption and several membranes are missing it is impossible to give the exact date.

Near by in the sale room was a box of oddments, largely consisting of old school books and miscellaneous articles. Upon turning these over the writer noticed a folio manuscript volume, bound in leather, and found that this was the steward's records of leases of various properties belonging to the Somerset family in Herefordshire in the seventeenth century. A commission to purchase the two manuscripts for Hereford Public Library was unsuccessful, but later they were secured by negotiation. Upon closer examination the volume was found to have served two purposes. It had been turned upside down and the one end used to record the private purse expenses of the marquis of Hertford for a year from Michaelmas 1641 to Michaelmas 1642 by William Booth, his steward. It had been intended to record six months' expenditure only, but this had been extended to the full year, as noted in a different handwriting.