a little more glow and energy. But, from some cause or another, energy-that literary quality which enables the writer to bear the reader's imagination along whether the with the writer or not seems reader agrees to have gone out of fashion. Sometimes, however, Mr. Gosse does undoubtedly rise to positive eloquence, as, for instance, in the long passage in which, discussing the relations between Gray and Fielding, he defends, with much generous warmth, what he calls the "mutual admiration societies" of our own day. And no doubt his arguments deserve attention.

"We

may

kere confess," says he, "that Gray certainly misses, in common with most men of his time, the one great charm of the literary character at its best, namely, enthusiasm for excellence in contemporaries. It is a sign of a dry age when the principal authors of a country look askance on one another. Some silly critics in cur own days have discovered with indignant horror the existence of 'mutual admiration societies.' A little more acquaintance with the history of literature might have shown them how strong the sentiment of comradeship has been in every age of real intellectual vitality. It is much to be deplored that the chilly air of the eighteenth century prevented the mutual admiration' of such men as Gray and Fielding." We have not seen the strictures of the "silly critics" who are here castigated; but perhaps they, the critics, might reply that the point as to whether "mutual admiration societies" are sublime or ridiculous depends greatly upon the quality of the membersdepends, in short, upon the very question here raised and begged, whether the mutual admirers are or are not "such men as Gray and Fielding."

A passage at the close of this volume provokes surprise and dissent. Of the many acts of vandalism perpetrated since Wyatt's time, one of the most wanton was the destruction of the college hall where Gray was seized with his fatal illness, and which had been trodden by the feet of Spenser. Such sacrilege, it might be supposed, would have been resented by every man who cared for poetry. Yet Mr. Gosse speaks of it as if the substitution of commonplace modern Gothic for the venerable buildings that Gray loved were a fitting tribute to his hero's memory! This curious insensibility to the charm of art and history is unworthy of a writer of Mr. Gosse's distinction.

NOVELS OF THE WEEK.

How They Loved Him. By Florence Marryat (Mrs. Francis Lean). 3 vols. (White & Co.) A Ball-room Repentance. By Mrs. Edwardes. 2 vols. (Bentley & Son.) AFTER a careful study of Ouida's recent works Mrs. Francis Lean has written a

stronger book than she ever wrote before. So much may be said for 'How They Loved Him.' It is not a pleasant story, either in its details or in its general aim. The seduction of an innocent girl of fifteen or sixteen and the substitution of her illegitimate child for a legitimate one that died are certainly not pleasant details. But it is still less pleasant to find a woman writing down her sex and exposing its weaknesses with a mixture of pity and contempt. Such things must, it is said, be done in the interests of truth and of art; but, on the whole, it is

are told, all the prisoners were liberated by their gaoler because he had no food allowed him for their support, and he was told that if any

way

'A Ball-room Repentance' is not Mrs. Edwardes's best book, but it is so much better than the majority of the productions of her school that, judging by their standard, it is easy to overrate its merits. Yet at all events there is a story in the book and some decided character. Mrs. Edwardes shows, too, that strong feeling, if not genuine passion, can be dealt with without outraging propriety, and readers of the fashionable ladynovelists are pleased to be reminded that this is possible. Mrs. Edwardes lays her scenes at various foreign places-Monaco, Nice, Rome, and Switzerland-and adds something to her pictures of life by pleasant treatment of the backgrounds; but landscape is not her strongest point. The heroine is well conceived; and the scheming mother is a pleasant variation, with her taste for miscellaneous reading, which, by the way, recalls A Blue Stocking.' Mrs. Edwardes to some extent discovered the character, and is entitled to make the most of it. It has capabilities which she has not The end of the story of A exhausted. Ball-room Repentance' is happy, and it is prettily told; but many readers will think that the heroine was a little too thoughtless and unkind in her final treatment of the poor young Oxford man, who, after all, had adored her, had saved her life, and had proved his devotion in the manliest and most unselfish way. She ought to have said more than" We shall probably never meet again; good-bye, and I am much obliged to you."

HISTORICAL AND ANTIQUARIAN PUBLICATIONS.

IN noticing Mr. J. T. Godfrey's The Court of the Honour of Peverel, in the Counties of Nottingham and Derby (Nottingham, Derry), it is scarcely necessary to explain that the honour of Peverel took its name from William Peverel, the Norman, about whose parentage so much nonsense has been written. Gundreda de Warenne herself has not given occasion for more unreasoning speculation. The court of the honour does not seem to have differed materially from other manorial courts which Middle Ages. This one-owing to a series of existed in more than sufficient plenty during the fortunate, or perhaps we should say unfortunate, circumstances-remained in being, a shadow of its old self, until it was abolished by statute a little more than thirty years ago. Its ancient powers had long been curtailed, and in modern times it was but a cumbrous and uncertain

machine for the recovery of debts. It had its prison down to the end of the last century. A gentleman who visited this building in 1798 gives a horrible picture of the misery of the poor inmates. If half of what he says be true he might well speak of it as a disgraceful dreg of the feudal law." On one occasion, we

66

IN his paper on Kings' Briefs: their Purposes and History, printed for private circulation, Mr. Cornelius Walford has undertaken to illustrate a phase of our social life which has been hitherto almost entirely neglected by historians and antiquaries. As the first book on the subject with any claims to be considered an historical treatise, it is worthy of notice, especially as great care has evidently been taken in the accumulation and arrangement of the material. The notices of briefs, as far as they occur in printed literature, are so widely scattered, and occur in such unlikely and obscure places, that Mr. Walford is not to be severely censured because he has not come upon every notice of them which has been deemed worthy of printers' ink. It is probable that the word "brief" will convey but a very vague idea to many persons of the present generation. Etymology will not help them, and most of our popular books of reference are silent, or only give information of a very vague character. A brief, in the sense Mr. Walford uses the word and in which it was painfully familiar to our grandfathers, was a royal mandate ordering collections to be made in churches and chapels, for building or rebuilding churches, for the relief of sufferers from fire, and sometimes also of those who had sustained losses on the sea, or of suffering Protestants abroad and refugees in this country. When they originated is unknown; for many generations they seem to have been very

The demand

useful and not more subject to abuse than other State aids have been found to be. In the latter part of the last century, owing to the development of the newspaper press, they had become wellnigh useless. by Act of Parliament in 1828. They were abolished that they should be put an end to had been clamorous for several years before they ceased to be issued. The expense of the machinery by which they were worked was very great, and the result commonly but small. In many parishes no collections were made; in some the ministers refused to read them; in others it was determined in parish vestry that they should be disregarded, but that a small sum, commonly one shilling, should be paid from the church-rate on each. No complete list of briefs has, as far as we know, ever been compiled, and if there be not among the State papers material for making such a calendar, we doubt if it will ever be possible to make one complete. The pages of local archæological societies' reports contain many extracts from parish accounts bearing on the subject; but it does not seem to have been the duty of the clergyman or any one else to keep a register of them. The most complete catalogue we know of is in the parish register of Stanton St. John's, near Oxford. This furnishes a pretty complete catalogue from 1662 to 1759 with a few memoranda of earlier date. The whole was printed in the tenth volume of the Reliquary. The Journal Books of the House of Commons furnish January 31st, 1643, Henry Marten, the regicide, interesting data for the historian of briefs. On was appointed "to bring in an order for inhibiting any collections upon any brief under the Great Seal." The king and the Parliament were then at war, and we imagine that it occurred to the latter that money might be raised in this manner to supply the king's wants, or to reward those who had suffered in his cause. On January 10th, 1648, a further order was made that no collections should be made on briefs except under the Great Seal "directed by order of both Houses of Parliament." Notices remain of several of these Parliamentary briefs. They seem to have been issued mainly to raise

funds for repairing the mischief done during the civil war. Bridgenorth, Milton Abbas, and Hagborne are among the places for which we have evidence of collections being made. It would be an interesting fact to ascertain whether there was a brief for the succour of the Protestant sufferers in the great Irish rebellion. We think there was, but are not in a position to prove it. The Netherlands came forward with a magnificent subscription in aid of their coreligionists. The then unexampled sum of 31,218l. 12s. 6d. was raised by voluntary contribution and deposited in the hands of eight commissioners, citizens of Amsterdam and Middleburgh. If Mr. Walford would compile a list, as complete as possible, of all briefs which have been issued, he would be doing service to the students of local history.

To the third part of the second volume of the new series of the Transactions of the Essex Archæological Society (Colchester, Wills), Mr. J. E. Price contributes an instructive paper on a Roman altar recently found at Colchester. It is dedicated, as it seems, to the Dea Matres by a citizen of some place represented by the contraction Cant. This was no doubt quite intelligible when the sculptor carved it, but to us it conveys no certain knowledge. The mother goddesses are described in this inscription as Sulevæ, a word of rare occurrence in inscriptions. The Des Matres were invoked, as is shown by inscriptions, throughout the greater part of the Roman world; their worship was, it is probable, a late development. As household goddesses they were the beneficent protectors, as contrasted with the Lamiæ, who were objects of dread, from the belief that they wandered about at night and devoured the flesh of human beings. Two inscriptions have been found in Britain dedicated to Matribus Parcis. These foul beings could only have been invoked to ward off calamity. Mr. W. H. King prints some Essex church inventories of the time of Edward VI. They

contain little that is not to be met with in other papers of the same kind, but will be of service to local antiquaries. There is also a careful but not very conclusive paper, by Mr. H. Ecroyd Smith, on an ancient burial-place at Saffron Walden; and a paper on the sons of the clergy who were admitted to Colchester Grammar School during a part of the seventeenth century. The Journal of the Derbyshire Archæological and Natural History Society, Vol. IV., 1882, is hardly as valuable a volume as that issued in 1881. There is no paper of any special preeminence, and although the publication of the correspondence about the rebuilding of the chancel of Hope Church will probably do good, yet it is not satisfactory reading. The Rev. J. Charles Cox figures largely in this volume, four papers of varied lengths being contributed by him. Of these, by far the most important is 'The Sacrist's Roll of Lichfield Cathedral' in 1345, printed in the original Latin with a full translation. Although very curious in itself, it has little or no relation to Derbyshire. Mr. Sleigh's paper on Sir John Statham of Wigwell is interesting, as is that by the Rev. William Hope, entitled 'Jottings about Old Derby.' In another paper twenty-two early FitzHerbert charters are printed at full length, but it is not easy to imagine why this has been done. They are very ordinary charters, and the information they afford might have been given in three or four pages. For all practical purposes abstracts in English would have been quite as useful to the members of the Society and would have been read, whilst these will probably be skipped, 'The Stained Glass at Norbury Manor House' is the title of an illustrated paper by Mr. George Bailey, which will interest antiquaries; whilst Mr. Thomas Heath's article on The Pleistocene Deposits of Derbyshire and its immediate Vicinity is addressed to the natural history members of the Society.

Collections for a History of Staffordshire, edited

a

by the William Salt Archæological Society, Vol. II., 1881, is, like its predecessor, a fine portly volume and is a very worthy successor to it. It consists of two parts, the first of which is taken up by two very elaborate papers, one embracing the Staffordshire Pipe Rolls of the reigns of King Richard I. and King John, 1189 to 1216; and the other entitled 'The Staffordshire Chartulary,' Series I. of Ancient Deeds. These occupy no less than 276 pages, and are edited by the late R. W. Eyton, whose loss will be nowhere more keenly felt than by the members of this Staffordshire society. In part ii., which occupies 147 pages, the contents are more varied. The Hon. and Rev. G. O. Bridgeman concludes his 'History of the Parish of Blymhill,' commenced in vol. i., and gives a number of pedigrees, more or less carefully worked out, of families connected with the parish. Much labour has been spent on this history, which is in every way one to be highly commended. Mr. H. S. Grazebrook contributes "Coppy of the Armes taken in the Visitation of ye County of Stafford made in Anno 1663 et 1664, by William Dugdale, Esq., Norroy K. of Armes," the original of which is to be found in Lansdowne MS. 857 in the British Museum, said to be in Dugdale's own hand. Mr. Grazebrook has annotated this MS. with much care and skill, and at the end he prints the "disclaimers" of gentility publicly made at Stafford, during this the last Visitation of the county, in August, 1664. The remaining paper in this part is by the same gentleman, and is entitled 'Obligatory Knighthood temp. Charles I.' It gives "the names of those Staffordshire gentlemen who compounded with the Commissioners for not taking upon themselves the order of knighthood at the coronation of that king," and is extracted from the original in the Public Record Office. This is, we believe, the first time such lists have ever been printed, and there is no doubt that the example which Mr. Grazebrook has here set will be followed in many other quarters. The members of the William Salt Archæological Society have every reason to be well satisfied

with this volume of their transactions.

The Scandinavian Kingdom of Dublin (Dublin, Thom & Co.), a work of the late Charles Haliday, a Dublin merchant, has been edited by Mr. John P. Prendergast, who has added some notice of the author's life. The history of the Scandinavians in Ireland is no novel theme. It has been treated of by many writers from the twelfth century down to our own time. To those conversant with the materials already accessible in print in connexion with the Norsemen in Ireland the work before us will not afford much novel information. The portion treating of the "Scandinavian kingdom of Dublin" is composed of excerpts translated from succinct Irish annals, vague sagas, and other published works, brought together, it would appear, mainly with a view to exhibit the connexion which of old subsisted between Northumbria, Iceland, and Dublin. The annalistic form adopted by the author tends to augment the aridity inseparable from a work consisting chiefly of dates and brief entries relative to persons of whom

little more than the mere names has survived. Thus much of the work is occupied with matter similar to the following, which we extract from pages 101-2: "Baugus was father of Gunnar of Gunnarsholt, and foster-brother of Ketel Hengs. ......Thordus, son of Viking, who settled at Alvidro, married Theoldhilda, daughter of Eyvind Austman; Ulf Skialgi, who colonized the whole another of his daughters, consequently both promontory of Reykeanes, married Beorgo, dus Mioksiglandi, who colonized the country were great-grandsons of Cearbhall; and Thranbetween Thiorsa and Laxa, was son of Biorn, the brother of Eyvind Austman." The promirenders more remarkable the circumstance that nence given by the author to details of this class he has omitted some matters of the highest importance in connexion with the Scandinavians of

Dublin. The reader will look in vain in this volume for a detailed account of the HibernoNorse coinage, or of the formidable engagement at Clontarf, near Dublin, A. D. 1014; or for a notice of the records, still extant, in which are specified lands held by the last of the Scandinavian rulers of that city. The subject of the coins is of special interest, and has been strangely allowed to remain in obscurity, although so far back as 1708 attention was called to it in a Latin treatise by a Swedish writer. An account of the Hiberno-Norse money, with accurate delineations of the specimens still extant, would be a valuable contribution to historical as well as to numismatic knowledge. Some of the details in the volume before us in connexion with the locality of the "Thengmote" and other vestiges of the Norsemen of Dublin were, we believe, given a few years since in Mr. Gilbert's history of that city. To Mr. Haliday's work on the Scandinavians are appended reprints of two papers by him, on the ancient name of Dublin, and on Dublin harbour in 1673, with reproductions of maps of the river, port, and parts of the city in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

AMONG the recently issued works upon technical and especial branches of science is. the Urkundenlehre: Katechismus der Diplomatik, Paläographie, Chronologie, und Sphragistik, of Dr. F. Leist in Weber's series of illustrated manuals (Leipzig, Weber). This is a handy little volume, carefully constructed as a manual for beginners. In many respects it resembles the well-known works of Chassant and the

Chronology of History' by Sir Harris Nicolas, but it is more comprehensive and systematic in its arrangement. As in most educational works written by Germans, the arrangement is admirable. The materials employed by the scribes, the styles of writing in vogue at various epochs, the conventional formule of language, the miscellaneous methods and manners of fixing, reckoning, and calculating dates, and the many interesting points which belong to the study of seals and early monograms, all form sections in this manual, which is illustrated with a series of fac-similes of chrisms,. monograms, and signatures of German monarchs. and magnates found upon original diplomata now preserved among the royal archives at Munich. It is in reference to the fac-similes that the work acquires especial usefulness, for these curious specimens of ornamental, or, to speak accurately, ugly, flourishes and twirls are seldom to be met. with except in the large, expensive, and often inaccessible productions of Ducange, Mabillon, Gloria, and the authors of the 'Nouveau Traité." Dr. Leist's manual has the merit of being portable, concise, accurate as far as it goes, and instructive in design and character. If it were translated into English and sold at a moderate price, there can be little doubt that it would be in request among those who have found pleasure in following the work of the Palæographical Society. to consult a dozen works to obtain necessary At present students have information upon the elements of their chosen art which this one supplies within modest limits.

UNDER the title of L'Entrevue de Bayonne de Fischbacher), M. Combes has printed some letters 1565 et la Question de la Saint-Barthélemy (Paris, show that the massacre of St. Bartholomew was which he found at Simancas, and which he thinks planned at the meeting at Bayonne. They seem to us hardly to bear this idea out.

first volume of an excellent Histoire de France WE can only acknowledge the receipt of the (Hachette). It forms a supplement to the same sous le Ministère de Mazarin, by M. Chéruel and concludes with the downfall of the Fronde. writer's history of the minority of Louis XIV.,

SCHOOL-BOOKS.

The Teacher's Handbook of Object Lessons. By A. Park. (J. Heywood.)—It is to be hoped that the " 'younger members of the teaching

feet high, and all of them bear the symbols peculiar to North-Eastern Scotland, the seat of the Pictish monarchies. On one are engraved the crescent with the V sceptre - bar and the double-disc unbarred; on another are the conventional elephant and the V barred crescent; on the third appear the V barred crescent and the Z barred double-disc-both of these superimposed on the traces of an earlier unbarred double-disc; and towards the top of the stone there is a circle studded with Ogam characters, regarding which I desire to say a few words.

This inscription, remarkable from its unique circular arrangement and its association with the symbols in an evidently very early form, has not yet been interpreted, for reasons so well stated in the late Mr. Brash's posthumous work, 'The Ogam Inscribed Monuments of the Gaedhil (p. 358), that I ask leave to quote the passage at length :

"Surmounting all, on the head of the monument, there is an incised disc, upon the circumference of which are cut certain Ogam characters, and arranged in such a manner as to be a complete puzzle to the antiquary. As usual with Scottish Ogams, the scores are all of equal length, or nearly so, and there are apparently no vowels; there are two scores which cross the line, but as they are oblique we must presume it to be a consonant; another difficulty is that from the continuity of the stemline we have no clue to the beginning or ending of the legend, while the confused position of the scores in relation to each other renders the satisfactory reading of it exceedingly difficult, if not impossible. Dr. Moore, in his "Ancient Pillar Stones of Scotland,' has given an elaborate and learned disquisition on this legend; he pronounces it to be in Hebrew, and to read 'Obhen Pethech,' i. e., 'stone of entrance.' ......Unhappily the doctor's philological labour has been lost, having been expended upon an inaccurate copy of the inscription, which is correctly given on the engraving illustrating this article, and which has been copied from a cast taken from the original stone."

;

This statement excludes Dr. Moore's version Mr. Brash offers none; and regarding the cast referred to, a note by Mr. Atkinson (editor of the volume) informs us that it has gone astray, and that the separate engraving of the inscription (pl. xlviii.), which professes to be correct, is taken from a drawing made from a paper

mould. As this last version differs from those

given in Dr. Moore's work and in the Spalding Club Sculptured Stones of Scotland' (pl. iii., No. 2), I was anxious to satisfy my doubts by inspection of the original stone, for which an opportunity has recently occurred. The result

H

B

T

is that while Mr. Atkinson's drawing proves to be fairly accurate, it requires the addition of an unaccountably omitted stroke (** in my diagram). This stroke is clear, though a little shallow; its existence was fully recognized by two gentlemen who were with me when I found it. Also, an ambiguous dotted line near the bottom of the circle needs removal, the course of the stroke (†) being perfectly defined. These corrections made, it remains to read and interpret the inscription, which the above rough sketch accurately represents as far as concerns the general arrangement of the letters.

In itself the circular plan offers little difficulty, the Book of Ballymote' (MS., c. A.D. 1370-90) giving the key for Ogams thus written; but three problems arise in considering this particular inscription: (1) Where does it begin? (2) In what direction does it move? (3) What is the power of the angled strokes? Should they be divided, and treated as consonants in conjunction with the adjacent strokes on the same side of the stem line? or are they angled consonants with a special power not mentioned in the key, or belonging to another key? or are they vowels, for some reason deflected from their usual straightness?

The almost certainty that an old Scottish circular inscription must move "deasil" (with the sun) seemed to answer the first question, leaving the second to be resolved by trial. Regarding the third, after many experiments it occurred to me that the angled strokes were the ordinary Scottish Ogam vowels, and that their deflexion was meant to indicate where the inscription began and ended. The stroke most to the left does not quite join at the angle, but the interval is too small to be important. Applying this rule, order took the place of confusion, and the inscription thus appeared, ATHAT BHOTO.

As regards the import of this inscription, circumstances seem to confine it to religious or burial rites; a mere proper name can hardly be signified, unless, perhaps, in conjunction with some burial formula, and it probably relates to the ancient paganism of Pictish Albyn. Leaving exact interpretation to those skilled in Celtic antiquities, I will only venture on a few brief suggestions.

TALKS WITH TRELAWNY.

II.

February 13, 1872.-Called again on Trelawny. He seems to be increasingly inclined to publish the further Shelley memoranda supplied by himself and Miss Clairmont, at his own expense if needful; on this point he will probably give me his decision next Tuesday. He agrees with me that several details in the Clairmont correspondence are too confidential for publication. I asked whether he thinks that Shelley, had he lived to the age of sixty or seventy, would have gone on writing poetry as his chief occupation, without taking up any other occupation in life. He says yes-poetry and prose. Trelawny and other friends had especially encouraged Shelley towards dramatic writing; and Trelawny thinks that if he had once had any public (more particularly any stage) success as a dramatist he would have left by Shakspeare," more especially in English or taken up that line of writing, "filling up the gaps other great historical subjects. Shelley once spoko of his poems as "alms for Oblivion"; and Trelawny believes he really did not regard them as destined to live for generations or ages. He never recited thein or read them out within Trelawny's experience, but may from time to time have shown a new stanza or so to his wife. A good deal of talk ensued about the profusion and hospitality of American living and means of life; about Sir Charles Napier, the Indian general, whom Trelawny knew well and admired intensely, &c. Napier, on being appointed Com mander-in-Chief in India, was required to dine with the Queen-a sort of thing he had always held aloof from. He mustered black trousers of his own, and put on a black coat and dress boots belonging to his valet. Trelawny believes that were war to break out between America and England (as now half apprehended by some people in connexion with the Alabama claims, &c.), England would suffer a downfall comparable to that of France last year in real damage; while, even if England were continuously victorious in naval engagements, &c., America would be damaged to no extent worth reckoning practically.

February 20.-I called again on Trelawny. He says that Shelley had an uncommon faculty for abstracting himself from anything going on about him in which he took no interest. If he met

On this view,

But I believe that both names and symbols will be found to relate to ancient forms of the worship of the sun-god Mithras, whose representative among the Celtic and other nations Thoth, Teut, Teutates, Theo, Diw-Taith, to menseems to have been the double-natured deity Tho, tion some among many names. Athat may be At-Taith, the Father Creator Tho, the Generator (passive). In old Persian (active), and Bhoto may be Bo-Tho, the Bovine theology the Mithraic bull is named Aboudad. The double-disc beneath the inscription is the sun, twofold in its aspects of summer force and mastery, and winter restfulness and subjection -or, with a slight change of view, the diurnal and nocturnal sun,-the active and the passive Generator. The moon relates to it in the latter capacity, and the crescent's dominant position in the present case may signify that the stone or temple-circle was chiefly dedicated to the nocturnal sun. The sceptre-bar across each symbol probably signifies divine, or spiritual, or magical energy. So far as known to me, this is the only instance of the super-imposition of one symbol on another. There is but one other inscribed symbol-bearing stone of similarly early character (at Kinnellar, some twelve miles from LogieElphinstone), and this shows in the angle of the crescent's V bar the letter T, the sacred initial of Teutates, which the Druids are stated to have frequently inscribed on the bark of cruciform trees.

Did space permit, these suggestions might be supported by references to many authors, but the subject is too large and difficult to be discussed on the present occasion. I may add that The Early Races of Scotland,' by the late Col. Forbes Leslie, is the best portable book for those who desire information regarding the Scottish sculptured stones and their symbols.

SOUTHESK.

came into play: in miscellaneous company he would get into talk with such people as he felt disposed towards, of which he would judge mostly by the look of the face. He was a good judge of character. His voice was not to be called disagreeable; in the high notes it was somewhat unpleasant, but he generally spoke in a low tone, very earnest and distinct. Trelawny does not recollect his ever saying anything funny: he "never laughed." (This, I suppose, is not literally true.) Trelawny knew the second Mrs. Godwin, whom he thought an ordinary sort of person; was concerned in obtaining her a pension after her husband's death, and Rogers very handsomely lent his assistance. Trelawny knows nothing as to the sale of his own book on Shelley and Byron. Moxon did once, some years ago, send him an account of the sale, but he did not look into it.

February 27-In the evening I called again on Trelawny, and once more had much interesting con versation-more, perhaps, about Byron to-day than Shelley. I mentioned to him two principal points in which a well-informed friend has contested statespondence sent over by Miss Clairmont. He attended ments made by Mrs. Godwin in the Shelley correto what I said, but did not enter minutely into details; in fact, as he told me once before, he does not make himself closely, sometimes he is hardly at all, acquainted with the missives he receives from Miss Clairmont. These last two times I have seen him he has scarcely (to-day not once) started the question of publishing the correspondence; and I incline to think he won't take any definite steps-for some while to come, at any rate. To my intense satisfaction, he gave me a little piece (not before seen by me) of Shelley's skull, taken from the brow. It is wholly blackened-not, like the jawbone, whitened-by the fire. He has two such bits of jawbone, and three (at least) of the skull, including this one now in my possession. I must consider how best to preserve it. I inquired whether he has any of Shelley's hair. Answer-No, the scalp having, with the hair, been all eaten off the corpse when recovered this point, I think, has never yet been notified. Shelley, Trelawny says, was not good at reciting poetry (this, however, I have seen stated contrariwise in some other authority); nor yet Byron, whose voice was full and melodious, but he had an affected twang in reciting, probably acquired at Harrow. Trelawny possesses the velvet cap-blue, now much faded-which Byron wore for about the last three years of his life, he making little use of a hat. Byron's head is known to have been small, Shelley's still more so. Byron's went up sloping to the apex. The shape of Shelley's could not be dis