To keep up the remembrance of the poor Fisherman of Galilee the Roman Pontiffs adopted the custom of sealing their private letters with a signet-ring which bore the device of St. Peter seated in a boat and drawing a net from the waters.

L'image des grands hommes est toujours précieuse pour la postérité; mais cette image le devient encore davantage si elle se rapproche du temps où ont vécu les héros, et si la représentation offre les plus grandes chances de ressemblance avec les modéles. A dèfaut des traits du visage, les anciennes statues, lorsqu'elles sont contemporaines, ont au moins le mérite de la fidélité du costume, chose toujours importante dans la reproduction d'un personnage historique. Aussi est-ce avec un soin extrême et presque avec un culte que nous devons traiter les portraits que le passé nous a laissés de ceux qui furent son honneur et la gloire de la patrie.

The Roman city known to us under the name of Silchester forms part of a large farm upon the Hampshire estates of his Grace the Duke of Wellington. The land was occupied till very lately by Mr. Barton, whose name is familiar to archæologists in connection with the place as having formed a small but interesting collection of coins and antiquities found within or around the walls. At Mr. Barton's death, in 1864, this collection was purchased by his Grace.

Although literary history is less prominently an object of this learned Society, and has less claim for discussion at its meetings than other branches of antiquarian knowledge, yet I may expect to be indulged with your special attention this evening, while I lay before you a long-lost work of one of the Revivors of Literature in the fifteenth century, and that the autograph and unique copy of a production, entitled Antiquarius, or “Two books of The Antiquary.”

It has been to me an agreeable task to comply with your request that I should examine and give you some account of the parcel of early documents, the exhibition of which before the Society of Antiquaries Miss Portman has been good enough to procure.

It will doubtless be generally admitted that the ecclesiastical buildings of the earlier centuries of the Christian era merit careful study, as well from the investigator into the history and antiquities of the Christian Church, as from the architectural antiquary. The style and ornamentation of the church and the baptistery must necessarily reflect something of the tone of feeling towards religious matters which prevailed at the time of their erection, whilst the form of the structure, and even more those fittings and arrangements by which it was adapted to ritual purposes, must obviously have been planned and modified in accordance with the views of the age as regarded liturgical and ritual observances, ecclesiastical discipline, and even articles of faith. To the architectural antiquary, on the other hand, these buildings are interesting as enabling him to study the decline of Roman art, and as links in the great chain of architectural progress.

I am enabled by the kindness of the Earl of Verulam to exhibit to the Society the original of a Document of some interest in the commercial history of this country.

The volume which I have the honour of exhibiting to the Society is the original manuscript of Abraham de la Pryme's History of Winterton, in the county of Lincoln. It consists of twenty-six small quarto leaves, one of which is blank; they are stitched together in a cover of marbled paper. Of its history I know little. It was given to me by my friend the late Venerable William Brocklehurst Stonehouse, Vicar of Owston and Archdeacon of Stow, the historian of the Isle of Axholme. He found it, about thirty years ago, in a cottage in one of the villages near Owston. There can be no doubt that the manuscript is the autograph of de la Pryme. The handwriting corresponds in every respect with that of other documents known to have been written by him.

I felt much interested in the little tract which you were good enough to send me on the question of the use of Human Sacrifices among the Romans. It was pleasant to see that the cares and duties of political life had not prevented Sir Robert Peel and Lord Macaulay from discussing eagerly an obscure point of classical lore.

It may be of interest to the Society to collect together such notices as occur of Edward Grimston, the ambassador to the Duchess of Burgundy, and the person represented in the interesting portrait by Peter Christus.

By the kindness of the Earl of Verulam, I have been able to make use of various documents, apparently unpublished, which assist in throwing some light on the ambassador's history.

I have carefully examined the very interesting portrait of Edward Grimston which the Earl of Verulam has been good enough to send to our Society for examination. I am glad to hear that his Lordship intends to have the surface, both back and front, protected by glass.

In the volume of “Miscellanies,” which has recently appeared under the able editing of your Lordship, are some remarks by Lord Macaulay, Sir Robert Peel, and yourself, on the Use of Human Sacrifices by the Romans. These remarks, which I have read with great interest, lead me to turn to various passages in classical authors that bear on the subject. The result of my inquiry I take the liberty of forwarding to your Lordship. I have not attempted to make any selection of the extracts, and, as I have no theory to support, I must request your Lordship to consider them merely materials for the use of some one with more leisure and greater ability than myself.

The tombs at Ghain Tiffiha, which is situated on the west or Gozo side of Malta, three or four miles to the south of St. Paul's Bay, are all cut in the rock, and, though differing slightly in form and dimensions, have a general resemblance, as will be seen by the following descriptions.

The human remains from Tomb 1 at Ghain Tiffiha comprise the more important bones of two skeletons. They are generally well preserved, though very light and brittle, as would appear from the almost entire destruction of the animal matter. They are uniformly stained of a dark reddish-brown hue, and here and there incrusted with a tufaceous or stalagmitic deposit of the same colour. The bones from Tombs 2 and 3 are, on the contrary, of a pale or drab clay colour. The dark colour of the former is attributed by Captain Swann to the percolation through cracks in the limestone rock of water tinged with the highly-coloured soil with which many fissures in the upper limestone of Malta are filled. The Tombs 2 and 3, on the contrary, had become filled with clay from “Clay-bed No. 3,” and hence the difference.

Early as the Romans were known to have visited the southern and southwestern shores of England, it is remarkable that so little should be left to testify to it. Historians inform us that on the banks of the waters that flow into the Plymouth Sound there was once a Roman station, but no record or evidence remains that can establish the precise locality of the ancient Tamara. Attempts have not been wanting to fix it somewhat near the present village of Tamerton, but it appears to me that there is little to support this idea beyond advantageous topographical considerations. The remains, however, of an old Roman road are still in existence on the property of the Rev. Collins Trelawny, which appear to suggest that the line by which those old travellers passed from station to station westward to the tin districts of Cornwall lay much nearer to Plymouth.