The very singular, or rather, as regards Italy, the unique bronze relique that I have now undertaken to describe and explain, I consider to be the same that was discovered January 4th, 1800, at the steep pitch of the hill just below the castle of Lucera. This we learn from an account of the discovery given by the Cavaliere Onofrio Bonghi, quoted by Gerhard.

No one has yet written the history of the Roman palate, such as it became when the successes of that people had given occasion for its artificial cultivation. The Roman, consequently, has never been contemplated on this side of his character. This is not merely an omission in archaeology, it is a blank left in the annals of taste. And the omission is the more remarkable, as most other subjects of antiquity have been fathomed by the learned, down even to the shoe and the caliga.

The five bronze vessels, now exhibited by the kind permission of Vice-Admiral The Honourable Edward Howard, were first recovered in June, 1856, from the spot where they had lain buried probably since the time of the Roman occupation of Britain. A party of drainers, digging immediately behind a farmhouse on Stittenham Hill, belonging to the Castle Howard estate in Yorkshire, came upon these vessels at about three feet below the surface, placed one within another, in a nest or group. The soil, I understand, is boggy, and the metal accordingly has preserved the smooth unpatinated face and brownish hue common with ancient bronzes found in wet localities. The form of all the vessels is the same, and approximates to that of a modern saucepan; but the bowl of each, instead of having vertical sides and a broad fiat bottom, is curved inwards as it descends, like a cup, and the base is ornamented externally with raised concentric rings. Each handle, which is shaped in simple but not ungraceful curves, has a hole for suspending the vessel from a hook or peg. Round the bowl of the largest vessel runs a narrow engraved border of peculiar pattern.

Leverton is a parish in the wapentake of Skirbeck and parts of Holland in the county of Lincoln. The name has usually been thought to be a contraction for Leofric's town, but, as the assertion rests on no better authority than the Pseudo-Ingulph, it may be dismissed without examination. Whatever may have been the origin of the name, it has suffered little distortion or corruption during the course of eight centuries. The Domesday spelling, though not quite the same to the eye, is identical in sound with that of the present day.

A Manuscript volume of songs, ballads, and instrumental music, which once belonged to Henry VIII, has recently been brought to light, and it is of interest, not merely for restoring a large number of songs of which no other copies are now known, but also because some among them were written by the King himself, within the first three or four years of his reign. Henry was then so much subject of his own songs, that these are of material assistance in forming a judgment of his early character.

Whilst the progress of Cæsar from the shores of Gaul to the place of his landing in Britain, and his subsequent advance into the interior of the country, are regarded as subjects worthy of the attention of men of the highest eminence in antiquarian and classical science, it may seem somewhat strange that their researches should have stopped there, and that comparatively little consideration has been bestowed on the progress of those military expeditions which ultimately led to the subjugation of the whole of Britain, and its incorporation with the great Roman Empire.

It may be agreeable to this society to receive some account of one of the most extensive, if not the most interesting, discoveries of stone implements which has of late years taken place within the United Kingdom. Indeed, so far as the number of objects found is concerned, the discoveries on the shores of Lough Neagh may almost be ranked with those of the prolific caves of the Dordogne, or those of the Pfahlbauten of the Swiss Lakes.

The “Old English,” or Anglo-Saxon, Cemetery at Stowting had not, I believe, been systematically explored until the close of the year 1866; yet its existence was rendered probable by the discovery of antiquities about twenty-two years since, when the road abutting on the ground was lowered by the parish authorities.

The castra of the Littus Saxonicum were nine in number, and are thus catalogued in the Notitia, the military survey made of the Roman empire in the last stage of its existence:

1. Branodunum or Brancaster.

2. Garianonum or Burgh Castle.

3. Regulbium or Reculver.

4. Rutupiæ or Richborough.

5. Dubræ or Dover.

6. Lemanse or Lymne.

7. Anderida or Pevensey.

8. Portus Adurni or Bramber Castle.

9. Othona.

In discussing the subject of the castra I propose to follow the course which my own mind took during the investigation.

In proposing to give some notice of Staffordshire Clogg Almanacs, it will be fitting to begin with Dr. Robert Plot, the Natural Historian of the county. Not that I intend to follow him in his description of them, which is the fullest and best that has ever appeared. This would be unnecessary. But references and allusions to Plot must be frequent. That the Almanacs bore the name appropriating them to Staffordshire in his day, is evidenced by the title to the fine plate to the History (tab. xxxv.), dedicated to his patron “the worshipfull Elias Ashmole,” which is, “The Clog or Staffordshire Perpetuall Almanack.” There is another proof that they were called Staffordshire Almanacs at an early period, and thus, as it were, restricted to this county, for calling my attention to which I am indebted to A. W. Franks, Esq. the late Director of this Society. One of these calendars, now in the British Museum, belonged to the original collection of Sir Hans Sloane, which was purchased at his death. It is entered in Sir Hans Sloane's own manuscript catalogue, which appears to have been made as curiosities fell into his hands, as “A Runic or Staffordshire Almanack.” The entry occurs towards the middle of the catalogue, and no doubt the Clogg was in the possession of Sir Hans many years before the close of his very lengthened life, in 1753.