which Lord Townsend and his worthy colleagues richly deserved to be hanged." On an argument of Lord L. (v. i. p. 16), about the "necessity" of a case, Sir P. F. forcibly remarks, "No circumstance can alter the intrinsic nature of JUST OF UNJUST. Necessity is a plea to justify a violation of right, but never is to be pleaded in support of a right. The plea weakens this right," &c. The old wormcaten book was sold to Sir G. Grey, for 21. 2s.

Lot 416. Junius's Letters, 2 vols. 1783, "with some MS. corrections of the text and notes, by Sir P. Francis."-21. 128. Mr. Morton.

Lot 417. Junius's Letters, with notes by Heron, 2 vols. 1804, "with some MS. notes and corrections of the text by Sir P. Francis."-21. 28. Mr. Armstrong.

Lot 419." Junius identified with a distinguished living character," and the Supplement, with fac similes. [The MS.

letter of Sir P. F. to his wife, dated "Bath, Dec. 20, 1771," was in one of these pamphlets.]-41. Mr. Armstrong.

Lot 421. Junius; a collection of the Letters of Atticus, Lucius, and Junius, 1769; "with MS. notes and corrections, and blanks filled up, by Sir P. Francis." Those letters were all written by the same

person, according to the "Introduction" to Woodfall's edition of Junius. It was the filling up of those blanks on which Mr. Evans had observed.-31. 58. Mr. Armstrong.

Lot 746. Tooke's Diversions of Purley, &c. 1786. On this work Sir P. F.'s notes are unusually severe and personal; losing his temper and forgetting his taste to an extent that could hardly be accounted for, except Sir P. F. were JUNIUS, and that JUNIUS still recollected the triumphant answer of him by the parsonthe most successful opponent Junius ever had, abandoning the contest and leaving the victory to Parson Horne. He points out different passages-say 350, “a bull” -331, "jargon," and other sentences are called abominable," &c. On the line, p. 400,"of the first he is silent," Sir P. F. observes, "To be silent of a thing! O thou inexorable judge of Samuel Johnson! With all thy grammar, thou art the poorest always, and frequently the faultiest writer of the very language you have studied most!" Surely the correct Sir P. F. would not have so confounded "thy," thou," and "you," and been so very hard upon a kindred spirit in politics, except there were some hidden grudge rankling in the breast.

SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES.

Feb. 1. Thomas Amyot, esq. Treasurer, in the chair.

John Gage, esq. Director, exhibited a Roman speculum, or pocket mirror, found in Dec. 1823, at Coddenham, in Suffolk; on property belonging to Sir William Middleton, Bart. Professor Faraday bas given his opinion that the reflecting surfaces are not formed of silver, but of a bronze body covered with tin.

The exterior sides are impressed from a large medallion of Nero. (See an engraving of them in the Gentleman's Magazine for April, 1825.) A similar article, impressed with a head of Nero, is engraved in the Supplement to Montfaucon, tome III. pl. xxi. and another, which was found at Arles, is described by Count Caylus, tome III. p. 331.

Mr. Charles Roach Smith, F.S.A. communicated a letter from Mr. W. B. Bradfield, of Winchester, describing the discovery of some Roman foundations and antiquities near that city, in the month of September last, in the course of the works of the Southampton Railway. The antiquities consist of a small male bust in bronze, of good workmanship, a small bronze statue, with feet distorted by fire,

several fibulæ, and coins extending from Vespasian to Gratian, but chiefly abundant in those of the Constantine family.

Sydney Smirke, esq. F.S. A. communicated some remarks on the construction of ancient masonry, particularly in respect of the modes adopted at various periods of forming a straight square-head over an aperture. His examples (of which drawings were presented) were derived from the temple of Concord at Girgenti (the ancient Agrigentum), the Emissario at Albano, the tomb of Theodore at Ravenna, the west front of Rochester cathedral, and a chimney opening at Edgcote, co. Northampton.

Feb. 8. Mr. Amyot in the chair.

The reading was commenced of a " Relation of the success of the love of King Henri IV. to the Princess of Condé,' communicated by John Holmes, esq. F.S.A. The writer was Sir William Becher, son-in-law to Oliver third Lord St. John of Bletsoe, and a gentleman attached to the English embassy in France. Though existing in several manuscript copies, and at one period prepared for the press, it has never been published; but it is characterised by Mr. Holmes as a valuable historical work, of a totally different

class to the merely scandalous memoirs upon which so little dependence can be placed. The Princess of Condé was a daughter of the Mareschal de Montmorency; and the Prince her husband was the first Peer of the Blood of France, and once heir in expectancy to the Crown, before King Henri had children.

Feb. 15. The Earl of Aberdeen, Pres. The Rev. John Montgomery Traherne, M.A. F.R.S. and F. G.S. of Coedriglan, Glamorganshire; and George Godwin, jun. esq. architect, of Pelham Crescent, Brompton; were elected Fellows of the Society.

The reading of Sir William Becher's historical essay was continued.

Feb. 22. The Earl of Aberdeen, Pres. The same paper was continued; and Will. J. Thoms, esq. Editor of the Early English Prose Romances, was elected a Fellow of the Society.

NUMISMATIC SOCIETY.

Feb. 15. John Lee, esq. LL.D. President. Eleven new members were added to the Society. W. D. Haggard, esq. presented sixty-four catalogues of sales of coins, chiefly of collections sold in Eng land, but including some sold in Holland and France. Mr. John Williams presented 117 casts of Roman medallions.

Isaac Cullimore, esq. Sec. read the conclusion of his memoir on the Dariks, or archers, of Persia. It appears that they were coined only for presents to ambassadors and subsidies to foreign states; yet they are recorded to have existed in very large quantities. The same design of a royal archer has been found on a cylinder, the work of a Medo-Persian engraver, now in the British Museum; he is there placed in a war chariot, shooting at a lion. Another cylinder, in the Leyden collection, also exhibits an archer, but more rudely designed.

Sir Henry Ellis communicated a series of remarks on the points of distinction which identify the coins struck at the archiepiscopal mint of York. The privilege of coining belonged to that metropolitan see from the Saxon times to the reign of Henry the Seventh, and during the latter part of that period Sir H. Ellis has recognised the mintage of nearly every archbishop.

ROYAL IRISH ACADEMY.

At a recent meeting, Sir Wm. Betham read a paper, wherein he stated his conviction that the Cabiri were a secret society or brotherhood, who concealed their acquirements in science and the arts from all but the initiated: that this society originated with the Phoenicians, and was for a very long period confined to that

people and their colonies; that the arts of navigation, mining, &c. the science of astronomy, and indeed all other branches of knowledge with which they were acquainted, were enveloped by them in mystic fables and allegories, to conceal them from the vulgar; and from these was derived the old system of mythological theology of the Greeks and Romans. That the word Cabiri, in Celto- Phoenician, literally means the confederacy or brotherhood of science. Cabar is a confederacy or secret society, i, of science. The four degrees or steps of initiation into this order, were named Axieros, Axiochersa, Axiochersus, and Camillus, or Casmillos. These were made deities by the Greeks, the Phoenicians them. selves encouraging or perhaps propagating an error, the explanation of which was part of the secrets of the confederacy. The confederacy itself originated at a very early period of Phoenician history, and seems to have partaken of the essence of the policy by which that people aimed to keep the world in ignorance, and to carry on in secret their extensive operations in commerce, navigation, and mining; the secrets of these arts being enveloped in terrible mysteries, which deterred the ignorant and unenlightened from interference. By these means they succeeded in securing to themselves for ages the exclusive sovereignty of the seas, the entire commerce, and the greater part of the wealth of the world. The discovery of the identity of the Celtic and Phoenician tongues has led to the exposition of the true meaning of the names and nature of these imaginary Cabiric deities, which the author explained.

On the 22nd Jan. Sir William introduced to the Academy a translation of an inscription on the 6th and 7th Eugubian tables, which he has found to contain matter of great historical importance reThese inlating to the British islands. scriptions are engraved on seven flat plates of bronze, preserved in the museum of Gubbio, a small episcopal city in the Papal states, about fourteen leagues north of Spoleto. They were found in excavating, fixed up in an arched room of a theatre or temple, near that city, in the year 1444, with two others which were lent to the Venetians, under promise of being returned, but were not sent back. They have, since that time, been the object of great curiosity and interest to the learned, and many attempts to explain them have been made without any satisfactory result. Sir William had collated the Etruscan with the Irish Celtic, and was gratified to find himself able to translate it by means of that language. The

inscription commencing on the 6th table and continued on the 7th, consists in the original of one hundred and eighty-two very long lines, and occupied considerably above an hour in reading. Part appears to be a sort of poetical rejoicing on the great benefits navigation had received by the discovery of the little pointer (the mariner's compass), by which the ships of the Phoenico-Etruscans were enabled to abandon the old system of coasting navigation, and to cross in a certain track from coast to coast; and the sea was, from an untracked wilderness, become “a noble space, a shortened space, a tracked space, and trade's high-way." It also mentioned the great advantages which had resulted to navigation, from ships passing the great mouth of the continent into the ocean in perfect safety; recounts the sailing to the west and north to the three islands, one of which it represents as being most fertile, and abounding in sheep, cattle, and very large black deer, and fish of many kinds; and calls upon the people to join the expedition setting out to settle these newly discovered countries, which were inhabited by a few naked savages, or, to use the language of the inscription, "to farm the lands of the west." At the end of the seventh table there is a date, stating that the inscription was written three hundred years after the great noise and commotion under the earth, or the great earthquake. The islands mentioned are too plainly described to leave any doubt of their being the British islands.

The Rev. J. H. Todd, F.T.C.D. has communicated to the Academy a short account of a MS. of the four Gospels, of the seventh century and in Irish characters, which is preserved in the Library of his Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth. The volume is a small quarto, in the minute hand called Caroline, common to all Europe in the reign of Charlemagne, but now only used in Ireland, and known as the Irish character. The present volume appears to have belonged to Maclbrigid Mac Dornan, or Mac Tornan, who was Archbishop of Armagh in the ninth century, and died A.D. 925. By him it was probably sent as a present to Athelstan, King of the Anglo-Saxons, who presented it to the city of Canterbury. These facts are inferred from an inscription in Anglo-Saxon characters, (and in a hand of the ninth or beginning of the tenth century,) which occurs on a blank page immediately following the genealogy in the first chapter of St. Matthew. The discovery of this MS. and the satisfactory proof which facts afford of its Irish origin, are important, as adding another to the

many instances with which we are already acquainted, of the employment of Irish scribes in the transcription of the Scriptures during the sixth and seventh centuries. It is now well ascertained that almost all the sacred books so highly venerated by the Anglo-Saxon Church, and left by her early bishops as heirlooms to their respective sees, were obtained from Ireland, or written by Irish scribes.

ROMAN VILLA NEAR BUCKINGHAM. Besides the Roman villa discovered near Bath, which is noticed in our report of the Institute of British Architects for the present month, another has been recently found within two miles of Buckingham, on the road to Stony Stratford, on a farm belonging to his Grace the Duke of Buckingham, who has given directions that the whole of the foundations shall be explored. A frigidarium and calidarium (cold and warm bath) lined with redcoloured stucco, and a quantity of loose tesseræ, which composed the floor of one of the adjoining rooms, probably the undressing-room, have been found. Large square hollow tiles, evidently used to warm the sudatoria or sweating rooms, have been dug out; also another floor, composed of loose red tesseræ, and a coin the reverse of which bears the cross and the alpha and omega, indicating that it was struck subsequently to the time of Constantine, and probably by one of his sons or the usurper Decentius, whose head and coin it most resembles, though the inscription is illegible.

ROMAN ANTIQUITIES.

On the 13th Dec. some workmen, employed in digging the foundation of a house adjoining the turnpike-road at Wotton, near Gloucester, found, about three feet below the surface of the earth, three urns of Roman pottery. Two of them were broken to pieces through the carelessness of the men; but the other is in a most perfect state of preservation, and was filled with burnt bones and ashes. The place where these remains of antiquity were discovered was on the border of Hermon-street (the via militaris of the Romans). In the adjoining fields were found numerous coins, chiefly of Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero, the whole of which, together with the urn, are in the possession of G. W. Counsel, esq. of Glou

cester.

Some labourers digging upon an old Roman road, in the occupation of G. Wooll, esq. of Upwell Fen, Cambridgeshire, have found two vases filled with coins of various sizes, in an excellent state of preservation, which are now in the possession of Mr. Wooll,

At St. Pancras burial ground at Chichester, which is parallel with the Arundel Road, sepulchral Roman remains continue to be exhumed from time to time. Mr. Thomas King has recently rescued many interesting objects, which were disinterred on this spot, from destruction; among which is a præfericulum of light yellow clay, of most elegant shape and outline, precisely similar to one procured from the same spot last summer by this gentleman, and two Samian vessels quite perfect. The potters' marks on these are CRACVNA-F. and REBVRRIS-OF, the s reversed.

The provincial papers of some two or three months since contained a paragraph giving an account of the discovery of a marble figure of Pomona, by the excavators on the railroad near Winchester. It appears however on investigating the matter, that the figure in question was neither found where asserted, nor possesses any claims whatever to antiquity. Errors of this kind, when discovered, should be at once rectified.

BARROW IN DORSETSHIRE.

A barrow, crowning the brow of a hill on the wild heath near Wareham, has lately been opened, and found to contain so many as twenty-four urns. In this respect it even exceeds the celebrated Deverel Barrow, opened by William Augustus Miles, esq. some years since, in this county; although the urns contained in it are of much ruder workmanship and material, bespeaking a far earlier era. In this tumulus the urns were all found at different heights, and above the surface of the surrounding soil. In the Deverel Barrow the far greater number were placed in cists below the original ground, and each carefully covered with an unhewn monumental stone or rock. One of the urns exhumed from the present barrow is of small dimensions, and from its lightness may be supposed to be entirely filled with bones, which are concealed by a hard crust of carth, raised like a dome above the rim. Its upper part is ornamented with five prominent circles or rings, and it is not only in perfect preservation, but is the most finished of all which have yet been discovered. But none of them are so elegantly formed as many of the Deverel urns; nor is there on any the least appearance of the favourite zigzag or chevron ornament of the Britons, so frequently found on Egyptian and Saxon architectural remains. Another of these urus, and of course the latest interment, was found very near the surface, covered with an unhewn flat stone, for the purpose of protecting it from injury. The question naturally now arises-was this

grand barrow the cemetery of some once celebrated family, or that of a succession of chiefs who filled the same office in council and in field? Either one or the other it was most assuredly. It is remarkable that at the bottom of one of the vases is pourtrayed a cross, partly raised and partly grooved.

On the 5th of October, a jury was impanelled at the Black Horse Inn, Rushgreen, Lewisham, to inquire into the circumstances under which a considerable quantity of gold coin was found hidden in the ground in the neighbourhood. The jury having inspected the coins, 420 in number, and which consisted of the Unicorn of Charles I. and the Broadpiece of James I. Mr. George Walford, of the firm of Makepeace and Walford, of Serlestreet, Lincoln's - inn-fields, silversmiths and jewellers, stated that he attended on behalf of the Crown, for the purpose of examining the coin in question, which he had done, and found it to weigh 118 ounces, one pennyweight, and one grain, the value of it being 4547. 10s. 6d. Charles Jordan, a labourer, stated that on the 22nd Feb.he was digging in the garden of Mr. Forster, at Southend, when he turned up two earthen pots, each covered over with lead on the top, tied over with wire. On taking off the covering he discovered them to contain the gold pieces now produced, and he directly acquainted Mr. Forster and delivered the treasure into his keeping. Mr. Carttar, the Coroner, addressing the jury, said it appeared from the evidence of Jordan, that the treasure was discovered in a depth of eighteen inches below the surface of the soil. Hence it was clear, according to law, that it was to be deemed hidden treasure, or, as it was called in legal parlance, treasure trove, and consequently was the property of the Crown; had the coins been found upon the surface of the ground, they would belong to the finder. The Coroner said the honesty of Jordan was highly commendable. The jury then returned a verdict of "Treasure-trove," and the coin was seized by the Coroner in the name of the Queen. The jury were presented with 10s. each for their attendance, and Mr. Maule, the Treasury solicitor, assured them that the honest finder would not be forgotten.

A considerable quantity of gold coins was lately found in Glasgow cathedral; and the workmen who discovered them having appropriated them to their own use, they have been compelled to give them up, in consequence of having been claimed on the part of her Majesty. The coins consist of nobles of Edward the Third, and half-nobles of Robert King of Scots.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

Jan. 29. After a long debate, the LOWER CANADA GOVERNMENT BILL was read a third time and passed, upon a division of 110 to 8.

HOUSE OF LORDS, Feb. 2.

Lord Glenelg moved the second reading of the LOWER CANADA GOVERNMENT BILL, which led to a good deal of discussion. The Duke of Wellington said that the rebellion might now, it was true, be quelled, but he entreated Ministers not to suppose that it was completely got rid of; he entreated them to proceed with their preparations, and to assemble in Canada at the carliest possible period the largest force the resources of this country would admit of. He repeated, that there could be for this country no such thing as a little war; and he begged the Noble Lord to observe, that since the 22nd Dec. the first day on which intelligence of the unfortunate transactions in Canada were received, not less than four important events had occurred, each of which was calculated to excite the deepest attention of the Government. The President of the United States had desired additional power in order to prevent hostilities on the part of citizens of those states against Upper Canada, and had sent an officer (General Scott) to the frontiers of Canada to examine the state of things on the American side, with the view to the more effectual prevention of the threatened hostilities. It had been seen that within a very short space points had been raised relating to the question of the boundary of the state of Maine, to that of the river Columbia, to that of Mexico, besides other important subjects; and he had no doubt that, in proportion as the present difficulties in the Canadas died away, other questions would arise which would require the most vigilant attention on the part of the Government of this country. The Bill was read the second time.

Feb. 5. On the motion of Lord Brougham, Mr. Roebuck was heard at the bar, at great length, in opposition to the Canada Bill, which then passed through the committee.

HOUSE OF COMMONS, Feb. 5. In a committee on the PARLIAMENTARY ELECTORS AND FREEMEN BILL, Mr. T. Duncombe proposed an amendment, in. tended to act as a repeal of the rate-pay

ing clause. Lord J. Russell said that the hon. member proposed to extend the franchise to those who paid no taxes-a totally different principle from that intended by the Reform Bill. If he admitted this amendment, it would go to alter the ancient spirit of the constitution, and establish the principle that insolvency and beggary were as sufficient qualifications for voting as independence and industry. Sir E. Sugden said he was against all alterations of the Reform Bill, which had worked better than he had expected it would. This he attributed to the good sense of the people of England. On the division the numbers were—For the motion, 206; for the amendment, 107.

Feb. 6. The Chancellor of the Exchequer moved for leave to bring in a bill to amend the law with respect to clerical members of JOINT-STOCK COMPANIES. In a case recently decided by the Court of Exchequer, the Northern and Central Bank had instituted proceedings to recover payment of a bill of exchange from a person named Franklin; who pleaded that there were two clergymen members of that joint-stock bank, and that consequently the bank was not entitled to re. cover. The consequence of this decision would be, that not only penalty and loss would be inflicted on clergymen who might become members of joint-stock companies, but penalty and loss would also be inflicted on every individual member of those companies. It was therefore of the utmost importance that an alteration in the law should be speedily effected. There were 180 joint-stock banks in operation, carrying on business through 474 branches, and comprising 2,766,000 separate shares, with a nominal capital of 66,000,000l. sterling. The remedy must be retrospective, because it was not to be allowed that a decision in the Court of Exchequer should vitiate all the proceedings and compacts of joint-stock banks up to the present hour. If so, a door would be opened to fraud, and consider. able difficulty and derangement would be created in the commercial world. did not intend that the Bill should contain any saving clause with regard to existing suits. He proposed that it should be entire and complete for one purposethat of giving validity to all compacts entered into by joint-stock bank companies, notwithstanding the fact that clergymen might have been parties to those

He