highest educational value, and as also possessing, even a little beyond some of the others, a special claim, it may be, upon the respect of Englishmen. That speciality of claim seems to me to accrue from the fact, that two of the early FOUNDERS, and one of the most conspicuous subsequent BENEFACTORS of the Museum, were pre-eminently Naturalists. Such was COURTEN. Such was SLOANE. Such was Sir Joseph BANKS. I shall have erred greatly in my estimate of the regard habitually paid by a British Parliament to the memory of the eminent benefactors of Britain, if, in the issue, it do not become apparent that such a consideration as this will weigh heavily with those who will shortly—and after due deliberation and debate—have to decide pending questions in relation to the enlargement and to the still further improvement of the British Museum. Be that however as it ultimately shall prove to be, if the Public should honour this volume with a favourable reception, it will be its author’s endeavour (in a second edition) to supplement, by the knowledge and co-operation of others, the ignorance and the deficiencies of which he is very conscious in himself. [Sidenote: THE FORMATION OF THE NEW DEPARTMENT OF BRITISH AND MEDIÆVAL ANTIQUITIES.] In resuming the notices connected with the now truly magnificent Collection of Antiquities, we have to glance at the organizing of a new ‘Department’ in the Museum. During at least two generations it has been, from time to time, remarked—with some surprise as well as censure—that the ‘British’ Museum contained no ‘British’ Antiquities. Sometimes this criticism has been put much too strongly, as when, for example, one of the recent biographers of WEDGWOOD thus wrote (in 1866, but referring also to a period then ninety years distant). ‘At that date, _as at present_, everything native to the soil, or produced by the races who had lived and died upon it, was repudiated by those who were the rulers of the National Collection.’ [Sidenote: Meteyard, _Life of Josiah Wedgwood_, vol. ii, p. 162.] At that time, assuredly, there were already in the Museum a good many British beasts, British birds, and British books;—no inconsiderable part of the ‘productions’ of our soil and of the races born and nurtured upon it. But, within a few months after the appearance of the criticism I have quoted, all ground for its repetition was removed by the formation of the ‘Department of British and Mediæval Antiquities and Ethnography.’ It is thus organized, in six separate sections:— § I. British Antiquities anterior to the Roman period. II. Roman Antiquities found in Britain. III. Anglo-Saxon Antiquities. IV. Mediæval sculpture, carving, paintings, metal work, enamels, pottery, glass, stone ware; and implements of various kinds, and of various material.