Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 3.djvu/407

 ii s. 111. MAY 27, MIL] NOTES AND QUERIES.

401

LONDON, SATURDAY, MAY 37, 1011.

CONTENTS.-NO. 74.

NOTES : The Museums of London, 401 Bishopsgate Street Without, 403 Inscriptions in the Protestant Cemetery, Florence. 404 Rousseau and England U ttoxeter's First Book, 405 Robert Ainsworth the Lexicographer Bee-Swarms Old School Account The Milky Way, 406.

OUKRIES : "Schicksal und eigene Schuld" Sir T. Mak- dougall Brisbane Cromwellian Pulpits Figures rising from the Dead J. Shipdem D. G. Rossetti on Art- Thomas Fletcher the Poet, 407 Weight of 1588 Cor- ballis Family of Ireland Col. Hewson the Regicide Junius and Bifrons Glass and Porcelain manufactured at Belfast, 408 -" Perth roat" Rags left at Wells- Father Quiroga and the Thirty Years' War Authors Wanted Clergymen as Esquires Gabriel Harvey's Marginalia" Porcelain" J^hn Erick Fifield D'Assigny D. Debat Clarkson Stanfield, R.A., 409 East India Company's Chaplains, 410.

REPLIES : The Horsewhipping of the Duke of Bedford- Historic Fires in Ancient Rome, 410 Boole-lead : Bole, 411 Rev. T. Delafield's Manuscripts Francis Family Copes' Britons, Strike Home ! ' Shakespeare : Tallis ACo.'s Edition, 412 The Collar of SS ' Ralph Roister Doister,' 413 Gladstone on the Upas Tree "Put a beggar on horseback " " Welcome as the flowers in May " Battle of Barnet " Clerk of the Papers," 414 Sir John A runclel Freeman: Beauchamp -Hanoverian Regiment, 415 'Hamlet' in 1585 Boothby Quarterings Sandy Mackaye Scottish Titles conferred by Cromwell, 416 Swedish Mission to Abyssinia Jenner of Widhill ' The British Critic '-Age of Graduation, 417 Woolsthorpe Chamney Family Peter de Wint- Justus Sustermans 'The Churches of Yorkshire,' 418.

NOTES ON BOOKS: Dean Swift's Correspondence Skeat's ' Concise Etymological Dictionary '- ' Compara- tive Studies in Nursery Rhymes' 'Sir Matthew and Lady Holworthy.'

Booksellers' Catalogues.

THE MUSEUMS OF LONDON

ANTIQUITIES : PROSPECTIVE, PRESENT, AND PAST.

The Morning Post of 23 March contained a communication from the Trustees of the projected London Museum, announcing that, having received from a generous benefactor a large sum of money for this purpose, they had purchased as a nucleus the Hilton Price collection of London antiquities, and desired to acquire other objects of historic and local interest. An appeal was also made for gifts or loans. The same journal on 27 March devoted a long and interesting article to the project, based on an interview with Mr. Guy Francis Laking, who has been appointed Keeper and Secretary. From this we learn that it is proposed to establish the Museum in the first instance at Ken- sington Palace, where the Jerningham collection of prints and drawings is already displayed. Sir Schomberg K. McDonnell has surveyed the empty rooms on the first

floor adjoining those already open to the public, so we may anticipate that here will be at least the first home of the London Museum, which should at no distant date rival in interest its prototype, the Musee Carnavalet at Paris.

There is good subject for discussion in the suitability of its home. The Palace is not without interest, but its memories are of the Court, far removed from London proper and its local history and memorials. Moreover, its apartments are too lofty, and the building is not conveniently situated. The alternatives are numerous. Mr. Lloyd Sanders, writing on 6 April, advocates the adaptation of some of the fine houses in Lincoln's Inn Fields. To ensure their preservation this would be eminently desir- able ; but they are small, and, unless used as a mask to a specially erected building, entirely unsuitable. A further suggestion points to the " Old " Post Office building ; but this cannot be meant seriously. The Secretary whose views are presumably in accord with those of the Trustees said : " We hope eventually to have a separate building, possibly in the city." This inten- tion may simply be the expression of a desire to be located in the historic centre, or it may be for the purpose of coming within the City to facilitate the absorption of the Guildhall Museum and its useful collect- tions.

The existing buildings that might be utilized for this much-desired merging are easily indicated : Brewers' Hall, Addle Street, of fine appearance : Bridewell and Trinity House, well situated and structurally suitable ; and Staple Inn, in an excellent position, picturesque, and with an interior which might be adapted without much sacrifice. The London Institution would be my own choice. The position is admirable ; there is sufficient room for expansion ; and the cost should not be very heavy, as the freehold was assigned in 1819 by the City Lands Committee to the proprietors, in consideration of its purpose, for the nominal amount of 1,500Z. If the subscribers are public-spirited, the whole sum required for its acquisition, including the sadly neglected library, should not be large. The style of the building is not unsuitable, and its apart- ments would require very little alteration.

A museum did not apparently form part of the original scheme of the Institution, but there is every probability that, until provision was made elsewhere, it would frequently have been proposed by the many excellent antiquaries associated with it