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 Avierica 47 1 Francis Doughty; to those for March Mr. Andrew McF. Davis con- tributed a valuable paper on the origins of stock-speculation; in April Mr. Henry H. Edes contributed interesting papers on the vice-admiralty ■court of the provincial period. The Massachusetts General Court and the Boston City Council have had printed a small volume containing the proceedings of the cele- bration by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the City of Boston of the two-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Benjamin Franklin. The chairman of the celebration was Dr. Samuel A. Green, and the oration, " Our Debt to Franklin ", was delivered by Carroll D. Wright. As an appendix are printed some selections from Franklin's writings prepared by Lindsay Swift. The Records of the First Church of Cambridge, Massachusetts, from 1632 to 1830, have been edited, with exhaustive indices, by Stephen P. Sharpies, of the Cambridge Historical Society (Boston, Eben Putnam, 1906, pp. ix, 579). The volume contains, in addition to the usual reg- isters, records of church proceedings which are of interest especially in the earJier periods. In the October number of the Historical Collections of the Essex Institute are printed some thirteen letters from George Williams to his brother-in-law. Colonel Timothy Pickering, 1 777-1 778. They are selected from the Pickering papers of the Massachusetts Historical So- ciety, and relate to Revolutionary matters. Further installments are to follow. In the same issue should be noted " Records of the Proprietors ■oi Common Lands in Boxford, 1683-1710". The Connecticut Historical Society reports two valuable accessions of manuscripts. Mr. James Terry of Hartford has given ninety papers of the Whiting family of Hartford, most of them relating to Connecti- cut's part in the French and Indian War. Miss Mary K. Talcott of Hartford has given six hundred letters written to Edwin Wesson of Northboro, Massachusetts, manufacturer of rifles, 1838-1848. The so- ciety is now preparing for publication the correspondence of Jonathan Law, governor of Connecticut from October, 1741, to November, 1750. The first volume, 1741-1745, will be issued during the coming winter. On November 20 the New York Historical Society celebrated its ■one hundred and second anniversary by formally opening the completed part of its new building on Central Park West. The Minnies of the Common Council of the City of New York, 1675-1776 (Dodd, Mead and Company), have been published in eight volumes by authority of the city government. The text is supplemented by committee reports and other documents. The work has great value to students of early municipal institutions. The volumes have been edited by a committee of the New York Historical Society, of which Professor Herbert L. Osgood of Columbia University was chairman.