NOTES ON BOOKS, ETC.
The Committee appointed by the Society of Antiquaries to consider what improvements could be introduced into its management, has at length issued a Report; and we are glad to find that the alterations suggested by them have been frankly adopted by the Council. The principal changes proposed refer to the election of the Council; the having but one Secretary, who is not to be a member of that body; the appointment of Local Secretaries; the retirement annually of the Senior Vice-President; and lastly, that which more than anything else must operate for the future benefit of the Society, the appointment of a third Standing Committee, to be called The Executive Committee, whose duty shall be "to superintend the correspondence of the Society on all subjects relating to literature and antiquities, to direct any antiquarian operations or excavations carried on by the Society, to examine all papers sent for reading, all objects sent for exhibition, and to assist the Director generally in taking care that the publications of the Society are consistent with its position and importance." It is easy to see that if a proper selection be made of the Fellows to serve on this Committee, their activity, and the renewed interest which will be thereby awakened in the proceedings of the Society, will ensure for the Thursday Evening Meetings a regular supply of objects for exhibition, and papers for reading, worthy of the body—and therefore unlike many which we have too frequently heard, and to which, but for the undeserved imputation which we should seem to cast upon our good friend Sir Henry Ellis, might be applied, with a slight alteration, that couplet of Mathias which tells—
"How o'er the bulk of these transacted deeds
Sir Henry pants, and d——ns 'em as he reads."
We have now little doubt that better days are in store for the Society of Antiquaries.
The Annual Meeting of the Archæological Institute commences at Chichester on Tuesday next, under the patronage of the Dukes of Norfolk and Richmond, and the Bishop of Chichester, and the Presidentship of Lord Talbot de Malahide. There is a good bill of fare provided in the shape of Lectures on the Cathedral, by Professor Willis; excursions to Boxgrove Priory, Halnaker, Godwood, Cowdray, Petworth, Pevensey, Amberley, Shoreham, Lewes, and Arundel; excavations on Bow Hill; Meetings of the Sections of History, Antiquities, and Architecture; and, what we think will be one of the pleasantest features of the programme, the Annual Meeting of the Sussex Archæological Society, in the proceedings of which the Members of the Institute are invited to participate.
Books Received.—A Glossary of Provincialisms in Use in the County of Sussex, by W. Durrant Cooper, second edition: a small but very valuable addition to our provincial glossaries, with an introduction well worth the reading. We shall be surprised if the meeting of the Institute this year in Sussex does not furnish Mr. Cooper with materials for a third and enlarged edition.—The Traveller's Library, No. 44., A Tour on the Continent by Rail and Road, by John Barrow: a brief itinerary of dates and distances, showing what may be done in a two months' visit to the Continent.—No. 45. Swiss Men and Swiss Mountains, by Robert Ferguson: a very graphic and well-written narrative of a tour in Switzerland, which deserves a corner in the knapsack of the "intending" traveller.—The Essays, or Counsels Civil and Moral, by Francis Bacon, Viscount St. Alban, edited by Thomas Markby: a cheap edition of this valuable "handbook for thinking men," produced by the ready sale which has attended The Advancement of Learning by the same editor.—Reynard the Fox, after the German Version of Göthe, with Illustrations by J. Wolf, Part VII., in which the translator carries on the story to The Outlawry in well-tuned verse.—Cyclopædia Bibliographica, Part X. This tenth Part concludes the first half of the volume of authors and their works; and the punctuality with which the Parts have succeeded each other is a sufficient pledge that we shall see this most useful library companion completed in a satisfactory manner.