But if so, how came this gem to be found in this neighbourhood? Alfred presented one to each bishop’s see in his kingdom, and there was no bishop’s see in those days in these parts nearer than Sherborne, in Dorsetshire. You will have remarked that Alfred in his preface mentions four persons who assisted him in translating the book: Plegmund, Archbishop of Canterbury; Asser, Bishop of Sherborne; the Priest Grimbald, who presided over the school which Alfred had founded for the training of the English youth; and the Priest John, who was placed by Alfred as abbot over the monastery which he founded at Athelney. Copies of the book, each having a book-staff, were sent to Plegmund and Asser, for they both were bishops. Can there be any reasonable doubt that this mark of attention was equally observed in the case of the other two collaborators? More especially as Grimbald was at the head of Alfred’s school, and it was in order to promote English reading that Alfred had undertaken the translation of the book, and John, though not a bishop, was abbot over the monastery which Alfred himself had built in gratitude to God for the victory he had gained. A copy of the book, with the costly aestel in it, was no doubt sent by Alfred to his friend John, at Athelney, as well as to the other three collaborators. The book and the staff were, agreeably to Alfred’s order, preserved in the minster, till, in the days of trouble, (probably at the dissolution of the monastery,) both were hidden out of sight, and for that purpose buried in the grounds of some neighbouring friend at Newton Park, in the hopes of recovering them in better days. As time passed on, the secret of the place where they were hidden died with the man who had hidden them; and when after many years chance revealed the place of the deposit, the book itself and the perishable portion of the staff had rotted away, leaving only the gold and crystal handle, with the words, ‘Aelfred had me worked,’ to tell the tale. This I believe to be the true history of Alfred’s gem. When I visited the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, in the month of July, I was shown by the courteous Curator, by the side of Alfred’s jewel, a smaller specimen of ancient goldsmith’s work which was dug up a few years ago at Minster Lovel, in Oxfordshire, on the site of an ancient abbey. It is smaller than Alfred’s gem, but, like the latter, it is evidently the handle of a reading-staff. The handle of Alfred’s staff was made of a size that might be conveniently grasped in the hand; the one from Minster Lovel was intended to be held between the finger and thumb. It is smaller and less costly, but the workmanship of the gold is so like the larger one of Alfred as almost to suggest its being the work of the same man.