the site of St. Helen's Priory; probably a mansion of some importance, for we may fairly conclude, when these tessellations are themselves of considerable size, or connected with foundations of great extent, that they decorated either a temple or the residence of some Roman of opulence and rank. The fine Roman pavement representing Bacchus riding on a tiger, which was discovered in the year 1800, opposite the India House, taken up and deposited, ever since invisible to human eye, in some inaccessible store-room of that establishment, could not lie more than a hundred yards south of these Roman remains in Crosby-square.

The last-named splendid relic, which we hope the liberality of the East India Directors, when their attention may be called to it, will allow to be transferred to the British Museum, was probably the floor of a temple of Bacchus, or of some magnificent festive triclinium.

To return to the pavement existing in Crosby-square, which I had not an opportunity of observing at the time of its discovery. I do not conceive it was the floor of an hypocaust (the ὑπόκαυστον, adopted from the Greeks by the Romans, for heating their baths), for the bed of mortar in which it was laid was not of the usual depth, nor did I hear of any brick piers on which it rested.

The Romans employed, I think, in the climate of this country, for the heating of their ordinary domestic apartments, either camini or chimneys, (one of which a curious example was found at Bignor, constructed like the sides of a Rumford stove), or braziers with burning charcoal, of which specimens were found at Pompeii. These, when the exclusion of external air was less perfect than in our modern houses, (although glazed windows were not entirely unknown to the Romans,) could be used with less danger of suffocation than in our present dwellings. I am justified in coming to this con

An excellent coloured print of this pavement was published by Mr. T. Fisher shortly after its discovery. The British Museum have but one Londinian relic of this kind, smaller and of less interest, that from the site of the Bank of England, contiguous to Lothbury. This is also published by Mr. Fisher.

clusion by having observed numerous terras-floors of Roman houses, revealed by recent excavations into the site of Roman London, unsupported by any other but the natural substratum. Indeed, for the use of the domestic hearth, with its cheerful blazing fire, for which no contrivance of flue pipe conveying caloric can compensate, we have the authority of Horace

Dissolve frigus, ligna super foco
large reponens.

In the construction of their habitations in London, chalk seems to have been extensively used by the Roman settlers. It was much more readily obtained by them than stone, from the cliffs bordering on the river near Purfleet, Northflcet, &c. and the Thames afforded a ready means of conveyance. Their numerous wells in London were neatly steined with squared chalk; their houses were built of it, the walls of which were generally about two feet in thickness. They were lined on the inside with a coating of fine stucco, in painting which red was the predominant colour, varied with borders of black, green, or yellow streaks. Their mortar always contained a great abundance of the river-sand, from which they were not careful to remove the coarser pebbles, as these contributed materially to bind the material together. Of the combining quality of the ferruginous and sulphurcous particles, mixed with the gravel in the bottom of the Thames, curious evidence is derived from the Roman coins which have been found in great number, firmly fixed in masses of gravel concrete, taken up near the old London Bridge. I have seen as many as ten or a dozen brass coins fixed in a piece of gravel concrete, weighing about a pound, which could by no means be detached from the substance which had thus by chance enclosed them. The London sub-soil abounds strongly with a sulphureous principle. The black mud turned up from the course of ancient Wall-brook, on the application of heat, emitted strong sulphureous odour. The topographer has had opportunity of late, of observing the direction of that ancient water-way; he may see indications of it in the new street opening from London Wall to the northwest corner of the Bank of England in Lothbury: it proceeded

thence down Prince's-street towards Walbrook, and the labourers say that its bed lay at fifty feet deep from the present surface. Certain it is, that when the excavation was carrying on lately in Prince's-street, it so far shook the walls of the Bank, as to cause a crack in the solid masonry from top to bottom. The fissure is now quite evident at a spot in the interior wall of one of the offices of the building, situated on its western side. Thus radical excavation has effected more than has been possible to Radical agitation-the shaking of the Bank of England!

Mr. C. R. Smith, an intelligent and indefatigable collector of Roman antiquities, fortunately resident near the spot in Lothbury, has preserved a most interesting collection of Roman antiquities found on this spot, and in other parts within the walls of ancient London. In Honey-lane market, where formerly stood Allhallows Church, various relics have been found, in addition to that mentioned in my last:-a capital of a Saxon column, adorned with twisted serpents, the backs of which bear the bead work so characteristic of the sculpture of the period; several brass pans; some broad knives, the blades richly watered with gold, exactly corresponding with certain similar instruments classed as sacrificial by Montfaucon. To these were found adhering several silver coins of Ethelred, a circumstance perhaps altogether fortuitous, as the knives, brazen pans, and tripod censer, were probably in

struments of Roman rites, and we

know that culinary operations formed a part of sacrificial ceremonies, as certain portions of the victim were appropriated as a banquet for the officiating

priests.

While about to conclude this fourth Londinian notice, I received intelligence, through P. Hardwick, Esq., F.S.A., of an interesting discovery of some urns in the highway at Whitechapel, for the personal inspection of which he kindly afforded me every facility. I found they consisted of a very large and nearly spherical vessel of

See our report of the Society of Antiquaries, this month. EDIT.

Some of the above artiticles are in the possession of J. Newmau, Esq. F.S.A., others of Mr. Smith, of Lothbury.

stone-coloured pottery, having a pointed bottom, its diameter 224 inches; this enclosed an urn of dark grey pottery, containing fragments of calcined human bones. Near this deposit was an elegant unguentary vase, apparently formed of a compound of clay and chalk, the exterior surface painted brown, and embossed with tracery and foliage, gracefully interwoven with the limbs of a running hind. The annexed sketch will give the reader an idea of the form of this remarkable deposit; it exhibits a section of the exterior urn and the sepulchral vase within.

It is remarkable that a large urn of precisely the same nature was recently found in the Deveril-street buryingground, Old Kent-road, and another some years since at Southfleet in Kent, which was delineated and described

by the late Rev. P. Rashleigh, in the 14th vol. of the Archæologia. A large spherical urn was evidently sometimes employed by the Romans in place of the loculus or square chest, which more commonly enclosed the sepulchral urn, the funeral lamps, pateræ, unguentaria, &c. These relics lay at about 7 feet deep from the surface, on the west side of Whitechapel High-street, opposite Red Lion-street, a furlong distant from Aldgate, and were discovered in pulling down a pump, to communicate with an adjacent well. Fragments of another large earthenware cista (if I

* Sce Gent. Mag. for Sept. 1835, p.

303.

I am happy to learn that the representatives of the Rev. Mr. Rashleigh intend to deposit the splendid articles of Roman costume, the fine glass vases, &c. discovered at Southfleet, in the British Muscum.

I AM induced once more to beg that you will permit me to avail myself of the circulation of your Magazine, the venerable patriarch of the race, with a view to draw the attention of the literary public to "The New Dictionary of the English language."

Every author who is upon the eve of presenting the result of his labours to the censure of the public, ought to be prepared to answer these two questions-Is there any want, any deficiency in the great body of our literature, which his work is intended to supply-and, Is that work, so designed and so constructed as to accomplish the purpose?

To the first, I reply-I believe the deficiency to be, and to have long been, manifest; and to have been also long regretted.

Dr. Johnson was sensible that in his day, not far less distant than a century of years, there was a want of an English Dictionary; and he proposed to complete a work upon a plan that should effect a remedy. I need not say he failed in doing so-he never attempted to accomplish his own project.

The leading principles of his plan were, that in his explanations, he should exhibit, first the natural and primitive signification of words, then give the consequential, and then the metaphorical, meaning -and the quotations were to be arranged according to the ages of the authors. This was the plan; what was the performance? He seizes-not the meaning, he does not look for it-there is no etymology; but he seizes, or endeavours to seize, the present most popular usage; which may be of ancient, may be of modern introduction: the explanation stands single, and disconnected-so do its successors, without a base to rest

upon the signification of the context ascribed to the word: the number of distinct explanations continued without restriction, to suit the quotations, where any seeming diversity of application may be fancied; and the quotations themselves are not arranged according to the ages of their authors.

The evil, Mr. Urban, cannot have diminished in the course of years that have passed since the publication of Dr. Johnson's book; it may have and has increased: and to the evil so increased, so aggravated, I do not say that I am provided with a remedy that will satisfy all; that will completely satisfy any. An author, if he has common sense, will rarely satisfy himself. In a work of such magnitude and complexity as a Dictionary, no vanity or self-sufficiency can quell the frequent consciousness of inadequate learning, and incompetent ability.

"Man can easily imagine, what he can never execute. The fancy can see a perfection, and the judgment can recommend it; but the hand cannot attain it."

When, however, I first embarked in this undertaking, I was firmly persuaded that the undoubted chief of philosophical grammarians had not spoken either idly or untruly, when he asserted that a New Dictionary ought to be written, and of a very different kind indeed from "any thing yet attempted any where.' I felt satisfied that this was not the solitary dictum of one man, that the opinion had penetrated into our schools and colleges, and that it prevailed very generally among the various intelligent and inquiring classes of my countrymen. I further felt that the volumes of Horne Tooke had developed a new theory of language; that the principles of that theory had, in the main, been well received; that they had settled deeply in the minds of literary men, both abroad and at home; and that, upon those principles, I must compose my work. The great first principle upon which I have proceeded, in that department of the Dictionary which embraces the explanation, is that so clearly evolved, and so incontrovertibly demonstrated in the "Diversions of Purley;" namely, that a word has one meaning, and one only; and that all usages must spring and be derived from this single meaning.

I intend, at present, to confine myself to this explanatory or interpretative department, as founded upon the etymological or radical meaning.

That each one word has one radical meaning, and one only, is not a dogma of which very modern writers have the sole right to boast. Scaliger asserts it in most explicit terms: "Unius namque vocis una tantum sit significatio propria, ac princeps." It is one of those many sound principles which have been met with in the writings of learned and sagacious scholars, and which have passed the not uncommon routine of being recognised and admired-neglected and forgotten. It is one of those, which they themselves have employed to very little purpose, and of which we are not warranted in concluding that they saw the tendency with sufficient distinctness to appreciate justly the real value and importance.*

It is approached in more recent times, but not boldly seized, by Lennep:-" Ut adeo apparent paucissimas, revera esse proprias verborum significationes;" are the uncertain terms in which he expresses himself. That this one, or these very few significations, are to be traced to sensible objects, is affirmed by Lennep, and not doubted by Locke:

"Spirit," says the philosopher, "in its primary signification, is breath; angel, a messenger; and I doubt not, but if we could trace them to their sources, we should find, in all languages, the names that stand for things that fall not under our senses, to have had their first rise from sensible objects." +

"Notiones verborum (says the philolo ger) propriæ omnes sunt corporeæ, sive ad res pertinentes, quæ sensus nostros feriunt;" and again, "Nec alias esse (verborum significationes) nisi corporeas, sive eas, quibus res, sensibus exterius expositæ, designantur." §

Mr. Fox,¶) properly speaking, can have more than two senses: its primary picture sense, derived from external objects and operations; and its secondary and consequential; a rule which would make Johnson's strange ramifications of meanshort work with dictionaries; and reduce ing into twenty or thirty shoots, to one original sense, and two or three shades of inferential."

Tooke is most distinct in the assertion and maintenance of these principles, (the one-ness or singleness, and the source, of the meaning of words); he adopted them as the sole sure foundation upon which philological inquiry could proceed; he, and he alone, has adhered to them consistently, and he has raised upon them an edifice, to which all must look as a model, when devising the groundplot for a superstructure of their own. His name will frequently catch the eye in the pages of the New Dictionary; hence it has been rashly denounced, that with me he is an authority whom I never question, and from whom I allow no appeal. I have done to him that scrupulous justice which I have done to all, to whose labours I have been indebted. Of not one single feather, unacknowledged, would 1 wittingly permit myself the use. Time will assuage the rancour of political hostility ;-the mists of ignorance, the fumes of conceit, will dissipate in time; and the immortal author of the EIIEA IITEPOENTA will stand forth untarnished and unobscured, as the philosophical grammarian, who alone was entitled to the name of a Discoverer-a name, which "every man, knowing anything of human nature, will always be backwards in believing himself to deserve." But it is idle to say, that his already; it was one guess among many; theory of language had been discovered he alone discovers, who proves. Of him, then, I will now only add, in

"No word (he argues, in a letter to

very book from which I transcribe them, and thus intimating how emphatically characteristic he deemed

You cannot shake him,

And the more weight ye put on his foun