On the subject of Nelson memorial rings, the Rev. Dr. Gatty, in ‘Notes and Queries’ (4th series, vol. x. p. 356), says: ‘I do not think these rings can be very uncommon, and I have no doubt that Sir Thomas Hardy and other officers serving under Lord Nelson received one. My wife, who is a daughter of the Rev. A. J. Scott, D.D., Nelson’s chaplain and foreign secretary on the “Victory,” has one in her possession, which was sent to her father, and to whom Lord Nelson left a legacy of 200_l._ Our friend Mrs. Mirehouse, a daughter of the late Bishop Fisher of Salisbury, has also a similar ring. We have always thought they were given, after the old fashion of “mourning” rings. The pattern is certainly handsome and tasteful.’ Mr. H. S. Williams, F.R.H.S., writing to the editor of ‘Notes and Queries’ (4th series, vol. x. p. 441), remarks that rings (with the Viscount’s coronet with ‘N’ beneath it for the title Viscount Nelson, the ducal coronet, that of Sicily, for the Bronté estate and dukedom) of this description were made in 1806 by Lord Nelson’s private friend Salter, jeweller in the Strand, and by the order of Dr. William Nelson, who was then Earl Nelson. There were fully a hundred of these rings originally made, as every admiral and post captain, then living, who was present at the Battle of Trafalgar had one, as well as every member of the Nelson, Bolton, and Matcham families. The custom of decorating the dead with their jewellery (including rings) has been traced in a remarkable manner to the earliest periods of the world’s history. In Genesis xli. 56, 57, we read: ‘The famine was over all the face of the earth, and Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold unto all the Egyptians; and the famine waxed sore in the land of Egypt. And _all countries_ came into Egypt for to buy corn, because that the famine was so sore in all lands.’ But Joseph could not empty the storehouses of Egypt to satisfy the cravings of all lands, nor sell away the bread of Egypt at any price when money became less precious than bread. Such was the state of things when an Arabian princess in Yemen wrote, or when in her name were written, to be inscribed on her sepulchre, some impressive lines. Ebn Hesham relates that a flood of rain had laid bare a sepulchre in Yemen, in which lay a woman having on her neck seven collars of pearls, and on her hands and feet bracelets and armlets, and ankle-rings, seven on each, _and on every finger a ring in which was set a jewel of great price_, and at her head a coffer filled with treasure, and a tablet with an inscription thus translated by Mr. Forster:--