The discovery of the kiln described in the first part of this report is a pleasing instance of the value of publicity in the field of archaeology. One feature of the post-war campaign waged by the Council for British Archaeology in order to induce the general public to report archaeological discoveries was the issue to sand and gravel companies throughout the country of the illustrated pamphlet entitled Sand and Gravel in History. In due course a copy reached the Apex Sand and Gravel Limited, which has its pits by the Foss Way at North Hykeham, southwest of Lincoln. In October 1951 an employee, Mr. E. Clifton, noticed in the bank of one of the water-filled workings a pit-like structure with a scatter of pot-sherds and fragments of clay bars, some of which he collected and handed to the Manager, Mr. W. C. Acott. The latter compared the sherds with the illustrations in his copy of the pamphlet, deduced that they were Romano-British, and reported the discovery to Mr. F. T. Baker, F.S.A., at the City and County Museum, Lincoln, who, from the description given and an examination of a sample of the pottery, was quick to realize the possibility of yet another kiln in the Lincoln area.

In the paucity of Communications I take the liberty of placing before your Lordship and the Society of Antiquaries, a Copy of a Plan proposed to Queen Elizabeth by Sir Humphry Gilbert, for instituting what is called a London Academy, that is an University in the Metropolis, upon a scale of considerable magnitude, with no mean pay to the Professors of Learning. My Transcript is made from the manuscript Proposal which was actually presented. It has Lord Burghley's indorsement upon it; but is without date.

A Roman kiln was discovered in 1906 by Mr. Harold Falkner, a member of the Surrey Archaeological Society, and described by him in the county Archaeological Collections, vol. xx, pp. 228–32, with diagrams of the kiln and representative pottery ; but Mr. Falkner states that this kiln was empty when he discovered it, and that he never properly understood this site.

Two small-scale excavations were carried out at Verulamium during 1961. In January it became necessary to explore the site about to be occupied by the museum extension, and several trenches were cut on the north-east and south-east sides of the existing museum building. It was not possible in the time and with the resources available to excavate down to natural soil, but only to examine those layers due for removal by the builders. Considerable depths of deposit are known to exist here, possibly filling an early ditch. The site lies in the west corner of Insula XVIII: the earliest structure reached was a timber-framed building, burnt down possibly c. A.D. 155. This was succeeded by an Antonine masonry building with channel hypocausts. Possibly c. A.D. 300 this building was enlarged by encroachment on the street frontages. It clearly extends some way outside the area excavated both towards east and south. The character of the structure is domestic.

A few months ago I ventured to communicate to the Society, through your hands, some observations on the structure of ancient castles, and the mode of fortifying them; apprehending an enquiry of that nature might possibly have a tendency to illustrate the more early periods of our history, and to fling light upon the relations of many particular events, which are interesting in themselves, but not capable of being fully understood, without some acquaintance with the ancient manners, customs, and arts, that prevailed in those times. The very favourable reception which that attempt met with, induces me now to trouble you still further, with a short account of a single fragment of antiquity, a very extraordinary piece of old Ordnance; which, although it may, at first sight, be deemed an object unworthy the attention of the Society, may perhaps contribute to illustrate some few historical facts, equally with more magnificent and important remains. And I connot help adding, that perhaps the collecting a number of such ancient fragments, of various ages, and preserving faithful accounts of them, may even be a means of furnishing a very useful comment on history.

I Have to request you will present to the Society of Antiquaries the following observations relating to Chess, which may be considered as supplementary to those already communicated by our worthy member, the honourable Daines Barrington.

Though Britain contains within itself all the materials necessary for building, it is probable the ancient inhabitants lived in holes and caverns of rocks, or formed themselves huts, which they covered with turf supported by branches of trees bound together with twigs of ozier. In after-ages, when commerce brought the Phoenicians and other civilized nations acquainted with them, they learned from those strangers many useful arts. But their habitations, according to Caesar, were in his time little improved, their towns were only a confused parcel of huts, placed at a little distance from each other, without order or distinction of streets; they generally stood in the middle of a wood, the avenues whereof were defended with slight ramparts of earth, or with trees that had been felled to clear the ground.

The history in the seventeenth century of a fourteenth-century picture can only be of secondary importance. But since many writers on the Wilton diptych and the Westminster Abbey whole-length portrait of Richard II have complained of disputed statements and doubtful evidence, it is worth while to set out a few new suggestions which appear to be adequately supported. They are based upon a close study of such sources of information as we possess, and may perhaps ultimately help to a clue to the undiscovered first owners and authors of the paintings.

If you think that the following account of some customs in husbandry, and the prices of various articles relating thereto, in the time of King Richard II. will furnish any amusement to the Society of Antiquaries, you will please to lay it before them.

I am sorry to say in answer to your note, that I am unable to send you the Remarks, with which I had proposed to trouble the Society concerning the Bayeux Tapestry, in as perfect a form as I could have wished; but as I understand from our noble President, that we are to expect a fac simile of this document, so very curious as giving in picture a continuous, and nearly contemporary History of the Events represented, from that excellent and most accurate artist, Mr. Stothard, junr. I shall venture in the mean time, to commit them to you, just as they are.

To form complete systems of early colonizations, of antient history, learning, and manners, from the few remaining vestigia of former times, to decorate them with the ornaments of language and erudition, to strain every nerve to give them consistence and credibility, hath engaged the attention and labour of the most eminent writers of this and the last century. Witness the works of Rudbeck, Bochart, Pezron, Bryant, Gebelin, and many more. To the sober eye of reason the talk must appear discouraging, and its accomplishment extremely difficult: no man, how learned or ingenious soever, can be depended on for supplying the great deficiency of matter which is necessary to fill up the chasms of antiquity. The attempt seems as arduous, and almost as absurd, as to endeavour to erect another Herculaneum with its prefect ruins and the lava that destroyed it.

At the present moment, nothing, perhaps, would so much extend our knowledge of the Roman Empire as a close study of the character and history of its town-sites. It is only by working out the details of inhabited sites—and especially of towns—one by one, that we can get the premises needed for certain general conclusions as to the history of the Empire and, above all, of its provinces. If, for example, we can prove (as I believe we can) that many provincial towns were founded or first developed, or began especially to flourish, in the Flavian age (A. D. 70–96), we shall gain light on the spirit of that age, and on the policy of its government, which we cannot obtain otherwise. These things are not told us by ancient writers, not even by Tacitus; archaeology alone reveals them.

During the summer months of the last ten years, I have been engaged in excavating the site, and tracing the walls and dimensions of the Abbey Church of Evesham, which was destroyed at the Dissolution of the Monasteries by King Henry VIIIth. no traces of which were visible above the surface of the ground. A regular Ground Plan and Survey of the Buildings is made, which, when completed, will be laid before the Society.

Having lately had more leisure to make remarks on the alteration produced in the aspect of Stonehenge, by the fall of some of the stones in January last, than when I first visited the spot for this purpose, I am anxious to lay before the Antiquarian Society a more full and correct account of it than that which you did me the honour to transmit to them before.

The heraldry of the bosses in the cloisters at Canterbury has been very fully dealt with by our Fellow Mr. Ralph Griffin in Archaeologia, lxvi, 447 ff.; under his direction photographs were taken of every severy and of a great number of the separate bosses, both the heraldic and the non-heraldic. About 120 out of some 800 were reproduced in Archaeologia and a complete set of the prints is in our library. The heraldic bosses in the Chichele porch were described by the same author in Archaeologia, lxxi, 125, where photographs are given of the twenty-nine shields ot arms that appear on the vaulting.