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NOTES AND Q UERIES. [11 s. xn. AUG. 21, 1015.

11,000 marks, as " the bible of silver-plate collect- ing." We have, however, in the present work what is sufficient for ordinary purposes. Tables intended to be of practical use to students are given ; and illustrations of some of the marks used at the Assay Offices from 1598 to the present time will be helpful to possessors of old silver.

The author makes the good suggestion that the Goldsmiths' Company should throw open their Assay Office to public inspection, and that the historic archives of which they are the cus- todians should be made as readily accessible to the student as are the papers in the Public Record Office. Mr. Hayden also suggests that on foreign plate " the word FOREIGN should be clearly printed between the lion passant, and the leopard's head, if they be put to such base use as the hall-marking, and consequent protection, of foreign-wrought plate." At present foreign plate is marked only with the letter F in an oval escutcheon very likely to be missed by a purchaser.

Although Pepys tells of drinking tea in 1660, the earliest-known teapot is of 1670. This was -presented by Lord George Berkeley to the East India Company ; it is of the coffee-pot shape,
 * and is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Mr. Hayden states that Thomas Garway, tobac- conist and coffee man, was the first who retailed tea, and quotes from his shop bills " the most curious and historical account of tea we have." There is, however, another claimant. In The Daily Chronicle ' Office Window ' of 9 July it is .stated that " the distinction of being the oldest established shop in London seems to belong to the hop in Leadenhall Street run by Messrs. David- son, Newman & Co., which was founded in 1650 by Daniel Rawlinson, the first English grocer to sell tea."

No article in silver has varied in shape more than the saltcellar. There is one at Christ's ollege, Cambridge, c. 1500, of the Gothic period, standing 9 J inches ; another (of which an illustra- tion is also given) is Elizabethan, dated 1601, ^nd contains compartments for salt and spices.

Whether the war will bring down the prices obtained for old plate remains to be seen, but previous to last August the tendency w r as for prices to go up : " In 1905 a mazer dated 1547 sold for 500Z., but in 1908 one dated 1534 fetched the colossal price of 2,300/."; and an Apostle spoon which could be procured ten years ago for 51. fetches now 30L

A remarkable exhibition of old American plate was held at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in 1906. One specimen was the historic punchbowl made by Paul Revere' for the fifteen Longfellow in his " Tales of a Wayside Inn" tells of ' Paul Revere's Ride.'
 * ' Sons of Liberty." It will be remembered that

Messrs.Garrard,who, among others, have rendered the author assistance in the production of this book, included in their recent exhibition of choice old English plate some of the rarities held by collectors. Their illustrated catalogue, a hand- some quarto, contains descriptions of 228 articles, and is a fitting companion to Mr. Hayden's work. It can be obtained for half - a - crown, and purchasers will have the pleasure of knowing that they are contributing to the funds of the Red Cross Society and the Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem, in aid of which the exhibition was held.

Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers relating to Great Britain and Ireland : Papal Letters. Vol. X. 1447-55. Prepared by J. A. Twenilow. (Stationery Office.)

NICHOLAS V. was one of the most interesting of the Popes, and during his reign there occurred the event which is commonly taken to mark the close of the Middle Ages and the beginning of Modern Europe. It is singular how little trace of his individuality comes out in these letters on English affairs, while the taking of Constantinople by the Turks is mentioned 110 more than twice and that only in connexion with the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, heavily burdened with debt on account of wars with the infidel, and intended to profit by the Pope's extension of his Jubilee Indulgence.

The chief contents of this Calendar are the usual dispensations in regard to marriages within forbidden degrees, and legitimacy, mandates regulating the temporal affairs of religious houses and churches, and indults of the several usual kinds. There are, however though perhaps more sparse and minute than in some of the Calendars interesting bits of detail to be found in the more ordinary documents, and there are a few documents of great independent interest. Among the latter are the induit to Henry VI., enabling him to translate relics of the saints to Eton College, and King's College, Cambridge ; the confirmation of Henry's grant of the property of alien priories to Eton College ; the erection of a university in Glasgow upon the petition of King James ; and a register of the letters addressed by the Pope to the sovereigns of Europe, urging them to the defence of John, King of Cyprus, against the Turks. Of great interest, also, is a letter to Vincent dementis, the Papal Nuncio in England, upon the petition of the prioress of Redlingfield, in the diocese of Norwich, ordering that these religious shall be permitted to say the canonical hours according to the Sarum Use, they having the requisite books according to that Use, whereas those which they have according to the use of the Order are irreparably broken with age, and others not possible to be procure:!.

As examples of interesting detail we may cite a dispensation to Margaret Meryk, an Augustinian nun, to be elected prioress notwithstanding she lacks from her birth the first joints of the fingers and thumb of her left hand ; several striking examples of the practice of conferring benefices on children ; a mandate as to a quarrel between two priests for the possession of a deanery, in which Queen Margaret had been taken as arbi- trator ; a note concerning one Thomas Franke, n physician, and believed to be a Greek, who had obtained possession of a church ; and the mandate to the Bishops of Ossory and Leighlin concerning the ill-treatment suffered by a Cistercian monastery in the Ossory diocese at the hands of Ormonde and his followers. In general, the documents connected with Ireland contain rather numerous particulars of violence.

WE cannot undertake to answer queries privately, nor can we advise correspondents as to the value of old books and other objects or as to the means of disposing of them.