This curious Manuscript, for the most part legibly written, though in a contracted hand, fills a folio volume of no inconsiderable size. It has the following title at the beginning:

“Rex. Regina.

“Liber Domicilii supremi domini nostri Regis ac Mariæ Reginæ, inchoan. die subscript, de anno Domini Millesimo quingentesimo trigisimo octavo: David Wod de Crage Compotorum rotulatore.”

On a blank leaf at the beginning are two Shields crowned, supported by the Thistle, one bearing the coat of Scotland, the other the coat of Scotland impaling the arms of the Queen.

As a document, however trifling in itself, becomes of value if it illustrates any event in the Annals of this Country, I beg to enclose to you an account of the Army with which Richard the Second invaded Scotland in the ninth year of his reign, anno 1385.

As the copy which I have the honour to enclose, of the Instructions given by Henry the Eighth to John Becket the Usher, and John Wrothe the Sewer, of his Chamber, relative to their journey into Cornwall, for the purpose of inquiring into the conduct of William Kendall, presents a curious example of the system of espionage which that monarch occasionally adopted, and at the same time establishes an historical fact which has, it is believed, hitherto rested on conjecture, it may, in the absence of more important matter, be deemed sufficiently interesting to be communicated to the Society.

Mr. Nichols, in his History of Leicestershire, mentions some Roman ruins near Stoke, in Lincolnshire, which were visible in 1670. Being in company with Sir Charles Broke Vere, and having this intimation of Mr. Nichols's in our minds, we dismounted at some rough ground in the hamlet of North Stoke, where there had evidently been buildings, and my friend soon found a piece of tile, which led to the discovery of Roman Baths and very slight vestiges of a Villa.

On the last evening of the Society's meeting I had the honor to communicate to your Lordship a Narrative of the Venetian tender of Assistance to King Charles the First in his Civil Wars, written by Sir Gilbert Talbot. I have now the honor to lay before the Society another Narrative by the same hand, relating to the unfortunate Attempt upon the Dutch Ships in the Harbour of Berghen in Norway, by a Detachment from the Earl of Sandwich's Fleet, in 1665. A copy of it is preserved in the Harleian Manuscript, No 6859. It shows very distinctly with whom the scheme of seizing the Dutch ships originated, and gives the true history of a defeat which has been represented in different lights by our Historians, of whom Hume is probably the most at fault. He ascribes to the King of Denmark a larger share of perfidy than was his due.

As every circumstance relating either to British or Roman Antiquities must be interesting to your Society, I beg leave to transmit to you some account of four Mosaic Pavements discovered in the county of Hants, and which, I believe, have not yet been described in the Archæologia.

Some years since, I submitted to the inspection of the Society of Antiquaries, Drawings of fourteen stone Pillars or Obelisks in Aberdeenshire, all bearing curious figures in rude sculpture; at the same time the Society did me the honour to read a few remarks and conjectures which I ventured to annex, with a view to throw some light on the meaning and era of such relics. Since then, I have, through the Baron de Penhouet, who has distinguished himself by deep research in Druidical mythology, forwarded copies of those which represent the most remarkable sculpture, and particularly of one bearing an inscription in a character hitherto, it is believed, unknown, to the Society of Antiquaries at Paris; from whom, it is to be hoped, these mysterious and symbolical vestigia will receive some elucidation.

It has been suggested to me, that by collecting the scattered notices to be found in military writers on the subject of Hand Fire-arms and their appurtenances, and adding thereto my own inferences from actual observation, I might form a Paper calculated to elucidate the matter, and perhaps afford some entertainment. I have done so, but whether it be of that high order that is befitting to be read to the Society of Antiquaries, I ought to leave to your critical acumen rather than your friendly partiality to determine.

In the new arrangement of the Horse-armoury at the Tower, which the Master-General and the Honourable Board of Ordnance were pleased to confide to my directions, I deemed it proper that several of the horses should be barded, instead of allowing the armour for that purpose to remain indiscriminately mixed with other pieces on the walls. Having, therefore, ordered all of such description to be brought to me, that I might put together those of a suit, I found some covered with black paint, which, on holding to the light, appeared to me to contain a faint resemblance of engraving. On removing a portion of this coating my conjectures were not only confirmed, but I instantly saw that these were the horse-armour for the suit, hitherto considered as having been made for Henry VII., and which has the characteristic contour of the close of his reign. On the whole being sent to Enfield to be cleaned, I requested Mr. Lovell, the superintendant of the small armoury department there, whom I knew to be very skilful, to take accurate tracings of whatever was worthy of remark. The result has proved the suit to have belonged to Henry VIII. and exhibits so curious a picture of the superstitious feelings of the times, which conceived a man's body to be doubly protected when not only sheathed in steel but covered with the legends of saints, that I am induced to beg you will lay the drawings before the Society of Antiquaries.

Having already communicated to the Society of Antiquaries, through your Lordship's hands, two Memoirs by Sir Gilbert Talbot upon subjects of English History, I consider his name to be somewhat known to the Society; and shall therefore make but a short introduction to another Memoir from the same pen upon the King's Jewel House, with the ancient rights of the Master and Treasurer. Both of these characters were sustained by Sir Gilbert himself, not only at the time of compiling the Memoir, but also when the celebrated Colonel Blud attempted to steal the Crown, and I have to acquaint your Lordship and the Society, that the particulars relating to that extraordinary theft are preserved in a fourth Memoir by Sir Gilbert, from which the common received Account in our later histories has been taken. This last Narrative (however it may have been pillaged and extracted from) becomes doubly interesting when we learn that the writer of it was in that official station which provided him with the most certain particulars of the robbery.

Should you consider the enclosed Paper to be of sufficient interest, and worthy of the attention of the Society of Antiquaries, you will oblige me by presenting it to them.

Though during the reign of King John several events transpired of sufficient importance to render it highly interesting, our historians have taken but little labour to clear that period from the obscurity in which it is involved. My endeavour in this is to dissipate the clouds which have so long overshadowed this portion of our history:

“Clara—præpandere lumina menti,

Res quibus occultas penitus convisere possis.”

I shall commence by noticing some particulars, which will, I flatter myself, render it alike valuable to the Historian and the Antiquary.

Among the Royal Manuscripts in the British Museum is a Volume of Saxton's Maps, published in 1579: upon the Margins of which the names of the Justices of Peace in England at that time, or soon after, are written, with occasional miscellaneous Remarks. Several manuscript Maps and Draughts of Sea-ports, Towns, &c. are added in different places of the Volume, likewise accompanied by Memoranda in the hand-writing of Lord Burghley, to whom the Volume at one time belonged.

The kindness of our worthy Member, my friend Mr. Lemon, having brought to my notice a curious document in the State Paper Office, I have, by Mr. Secretary Peel's permission, the honour of laying a copy of it before the Society of Antiquaries. In so doing, I cannot avoid premising the few remarks with which I mean to introduce it, by observing, generally, how valuable this manuscript appears in a statistical point of view.

I have taken the liberty of transmitting to your Lordship the accompanying Communication. It is an Extract from a Letter sent to me by my brother, who has been on a tour in France, and the account he gives of the astonishing monument at Carnac I have presumed may be interesting, the more especially as I believe there exists no accurate description of this wonderful structure. In the recent work of Mr. Higgins on “the Celtic Druids,” we have only M. Cambry's account of it, with copies of his illustrative plates, and these are shown by the present relation to contain several errors and exaggerations.

Your Lordship having sometime since done me the honour to lay before the Society of Antiquaries, some Drawings and Observations on certain Druidical Circles, I am induced to trouble your Lordship with a similar Communication, in the hope that it also may be received as a slight essay towards a knowledge of such remains, and their probable uses.

Conceiving that the pages of our Transactions cannot be better occupied than by the publication of such early and authentic manuscripts as may serve to throw light on obscure periods of our ancient History, I beg leave to lay before the Society a transcript which I have caused to be made from the Harleian Library of a Chronicle containing a very minute relation of some remarkable events in the two last years of Edward the Third, which, as our Vice President, Mr. Hallam, has observed in his History of the Middle Ages, have been slurred over by most of our general historians.

The Bracelet found upon the Sand-hills of Murrayshire, which was exhibited to the Society of Antiquaries at their last Meeting through your Lordship's hands, by Lady Gordon Cumming, having occasioned some Inquiry, and several of the Members expressing a doubt, in consequence of the narrowness of the circle and the extreme weight of the ornament, whether such could really have been either used or intended for a Bracelet, I have selected from the passages which occur in ancient writers, both sacred and profane, a few which illustrate the wearing of that Ornament, as well as the other uses to which it was applied. And I now lay the result of my research before your Lordship.

I beg to enclose you three Drawings, shewing the situation and appearance of those primitive and colossal remains, existing on the island of Goza, called the “Giant's Tower” by the natives. I am only able to send you the mere Views, because the measurements I took, and the remarks I made upon the spot, were given to my late friend Colonel Otto Beyer, the then resident Governor. To this gentleman we owe the clearing out of these antiquities, and it was his intention to have submitted to the public a very detailed account of his Operations, but sudden death frustrated the measure.

I beg to trouble you, as Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries (of which I have long been an unworthy member), with drawings of five Coins, which I conceive to be ancient British, and which have been lately found, very accidentally, near High Wycombe, Bucks. These five coins, with six others, were found by a miller's boy upon a place called Keep-hill, in the parish of Chipping Wycombe, about half a mile from the town. The boy was sent to the spot, which is very near the mill, to look after his master's sheep, and happening to take up a flint, to grub at a fresh mole track, two of the coins fell out of a tubular cavity in the flint during the operation, and upon examination, nine more were found within, the whole of which the boy brought to his master's house, where they remained some days, till the boy's father, hearing of the discovery, got possession of them and carried them about for sale. They are of gold, about the tenth of an inch thick, the obverse concave, the reverse convex; they weigh about 3½ pennyweights, and are of the size represented. Tubular flints, similar to the one in which these coins were found, are very common in this stoney soil, and certainly, if a person wished to conceal his treasure, he could hardly hit upon a less suspicious receptacle. There are remains of artificial ditches still visible above Keep-hill, and I think it may fairly be presumed to have been a British strong-hold.

Bartiné-Hill is one of a chain of eminences near the Land's End, which command extensive views over the English and Irish Channels. On its summit is an ancient Earth-work, or Hill Castle, (as all these remains with ramparts are called in Cornwall,) consisting of a circular mound or vallum, slightly elevated above the natural soil, and a ditch. It contains a well, now filled up, and the remains of three contiguous circles, of different sizes, the largest being 28 feet across, whilst the whole interior diameter is about 860 feet. Borlase was uncertain whether these small circles were intended for military or religious purposes, but supposed them rather to have been the sepulchres for some of the garrison. I will only observe that a Circle of the same description remains within the area of Caër-Bân, and another at Castle-An-Dinas, in Cornwall: Mr Pennant noticed similar inclosures within the Hill Fortresses of Wales.