ones, and an infinity of drawers and cabinets. The middle and most projecting bay, or oriel window, is assigned to the arts and sciences; the recess-walls being covered with portraits, and there are about a dozen casts of the heads of remarkable men. The glass-case in the centre contains various old mathematical instruments, as-astrolabes, quadrants, early telescopes, scales, dials, and drawing tools -shewing the progress of human ingenuity. Beyond this case stands an excellent specimen of brass wheel-work, being a large Orrery of the solar system going by clock-motion, which was made for Queen Caroline, wife of George the Second, whose portrait hangs in the dining-room: it was presented by her Majesty to the mother of the late Admiral Shirreff, who went with me to Hartwell when it was installed there.

It is not unnatural that a Director of the Society of Antiquaries should turn an earnest attention to the vases, Babylonian cylinders, encaustic and fictile idols, lamps, papyri, and other antiquities here collected; I shall not, however, detain the reader by a lengthy description of any but those of the ever-mystic Mizraim, and even that shall be in a separate section, so that it may be "skipped" at pleasure. An exception might be made in favour of a fine marble head, which the Doctor confided to my care at Bedford for some months. From its bearing the mitra, or Phrygian cap, and its youthful androgynous aspect, it possibly represents Atys or Paris; and it is remarkable as shewing the teeth, on a close inspection of the mouth, which are seen in but few busts. Poor Iarbus, voce Virgil, vented his indignation at Trojan heads

Et nunc ille Paris cum semiviro comitatu,

Mooniâ mentum mitrâ.

This bust was found among the ruins of ancient Tyre, and purchased there for a trifle by Dr. Lee, in 1811, of the Greek who found it; though even in this transaction it was necessary to obtain the intervention of the local Patriarch. It has been much admired by sculptors; and, on arriving in England, it was drawn by J. Martin, Esq. (Belshazzar Martin), engraved by F. C. Lewis, and published in the Rev. Robert Walpole's work on Turkey and the East.

This is as accurate a representation of it, on a reduced scale, as Mr. J. Cobb, of Kennington, could cut for me:

In hastily passing the Greek marbles, a mention should be made of those sent home from the Archipelago, expressly as a present to a present to the Hartwell Museum, by my friend and former shipmate, Captain Thomas Graves. Of these, one is a white marble tablet, having a representation of an altar with fire on it, a sheep in front of the altar, and various persons attending the sacrifice; below which is an imperfect inscription. Near this sculpture stands an actual white marble cylindrical altar, about two feet high, and fifteen inches in diameter; it is ornamented with three ram's heads and a wreath of flowers, but the legend is much injured. Next to this is a marble tablet, inscribed with thirty-four lines of Greek, concerning TION MENANAPOZ. No. 3073 of the

T

Museum Catalogue is also a marble tablet, representing two figures in bas-relief, the female bearing a long torch in her right hand: this is of the best Greek sculpture, so much so, that my late excellent friend Chantrey borrowed it for many months. No. 1312 is a slab of white marble, on which are engraven eight lines, shewing that "Theodorus, son of Papius, son of Papius, during his lifetime, has erected this monument to Theodorus, son of Theodorus, surnamed Metrodorus, and to his children, and to Poplius (Publius?) and his descend

ants :

ΘΕΟΔΩΡΟΣ-ΠΑΠΙΟΥ

ΤΟΥ ΠΑΠΙΟΥ-ΖΩΝΚΑ

ΤΕΣΚΕΥΑΣΕΝ-ΤΟ

ΜΝΗΜΗΟΝ-ΘΕΟΔΩΡΩ

ΘΕΟΔΩΡΟΥ ΤΟΥΚΑΛΟΥ

ΜΕΝΟΥ-ΜΗΤΡΟΔΩΡΟΥ

ΚΑΙ ΤΟΙΣ ΘΡΕΜΜΑΣΙ ΚΑΙ ΠΟΠΛΙΩ

ΚΑΙ ΕΓΟΝΟΙΣ ΑΥΤΟΥ.

No. 1294.-Ceres of Eleusis seated in a recess, holding a shield with her left hand, and a discus in her right; and No. 1295,-a beautiful female head in Pentelic marble, were brought to this country by Signor Athanasi. No. 3194 is a bas-relief which Dr. Lee procured at Athens in 1812, and, with his permission, it was engraven for the Rev. Robert Walpole's oriental collection: it had been found just before the Doctor's visit to Greece, and was much admired by M.M. Logotheti and Fauvel, then residing in that city. It represents a shepherd sitting, with a lute at his feet, among some goats and sheep which are feeding near him; and is probably a votive dedication to Pan.

There is a cut stone which was brought from Aleppo by the Doctor, the medallions and ornaments of which appear to be a favourable specimen of art of the time of Zenobia and there are also various fragments of ancient and mediæval pottery, encaustic tiles, and ancient glass.

Among what our loving neighbours, the French, would designate "sublimes bagatelles," is an Etruscan mirror, which was dug up at Canino, in Italy, under the immediate inspection

of Lucien Bonaparte, in 1829, near the tombs of the Etruscan kings; where it possibly may have been buried upwards of two thousand six hundred years. It has reflected more beauty than ever it can again.

Before quitting the classical department of the Museum, I should allude to a great loss which it experienced in 1848; and to which I cannot plead ignorance. This was the present which Dr. Lee liberally made to the Society of Antiquaries, of the ancient relics which he obtained by excavation in the island of Ithaca, in the year 1812, as detailed by him in the interesting narrative published in volume xxxiii. of the Archæologia, pp. 36-54. This gift withdrew from the collection-at one swoop-a magnificent flat silver patera, a tasteful silver cyathus, an exquisite little gold siren, a very perfect gold neckchain, the fine-beaten gold leaves of a chaplet, some terra-cotta heads and pottery, and a remarkably bright-coloured glass vase; with some gold and silver rings and ear-rings, and many other exhumed spoils. As the event is of interest in the Hartwellianæ, I shall here commemorate it by an extract from the Society's Minutes for Thursday, December 7th, 1818; Viscount Mahon, President, in the chair:

The following letter was then read from Dr. John Lee, F.S.A. addressed to the President and Fellows:

"MY LORD AND GENTLEMEN,

"I take leave to express to you the gratification which I feel from the mark of approbation from the Members of your Council, who have honoured the humble description of my researches in Ithaca with insertion in the Archæologia, and also with the careful and exquisite engravings of the various articles thereby rescued from oblivion. I therefore have much pleasure in offering most respectfully to the Society, for its acceptance, these relics, thus described and figured, with the exception of an ornament, No. 13, which is not in my possession; and I hope that you will be pleased to permit them hereafter to occupy a space in your Museum.

"I feel persuaded that such articles will be better protected, for the inspection of future archæologists, under your direction, and be of more use to the public, than if retained in private hands.

"I have the honour to be, my Lord and Gentlemen,

“Hartwell, near Aylesbury, December 6th, 1848."

"Your faithful humble servant,

"JOHN LEE."

The thanks of the Society were immediately voted for this valuable donation, and, Dr. Lee being present, the President expressed them to him in a short address.

We can now examine part of a large brick, given by Mr. John Barker, our late well-known consul at Aleppo. It had been sent to that regretted gentleman from Baghdad, and was considered valuable for the sharpness and high preservation of its cuneiform or arrow-headed characters. In these the celebrated Dr. Edward Hincks reads "Nebuchadruchar, King of Babylon, the Beautifier, the noble or genuine son of Nebuchadruchar, King of Babylon;" and he dates the inscription at about six hundred years B.C. There are also fragments of brick and pottery of a later period, some of which have what is designated the maker's mark. But it must be recollected that it was customary among the Romans, in their brick buildings-such as baths, basilicæ, altars, pavements, &c. to inscribe some of the bricks with the name of the laterarius, or the proprietor of the fornax where they were made. Tiles, lamps, urns, vessels, and whatever else was moulded by the potter, were marked with the stamp of the artificer, or of the owner of the property, these being often different individuals; hence such terms as ex prædis, ex figlina, ex officina, and many other instances which are of frequent recurrence in fictile antiques. For the sake of brevity, they often left out such words, and used only the genitive case of the proper name; of which numerous examples will be found in Raphael Fabretti's Book of Inscriptions.

Subsidiary to the antiquities, may be classed the carved weapons, paddles, and cloth of the South Sea Islanders; and the other arms, knives, implements, amulets, and articles of attire which appear in the miscellanea of the collection.

The specimens of the animal kingdom in this Museum are rather select than numerous; and the snakes and other reptiles, insects, and fishes are well preserved. There are the two extremes of large and small antelopes, from the Cape of Good Hope; and several of the birds from the same colony, presented by that indefatigable astronomer, Mr. Maclear, are new to ornithologists. Some of the serrated probosces of the saw-fish are unusually large, and the specimens of