SUGGESTIONS FOR PRESERVING A RECORD OF EXISTING MONUMENTS.

When, in the opening Number of the present Volume (p. 14), we called the attention of our readers to the Monumentarium of Exeter Cathedral, we expressed a hope that the good services which Mr. Hewett had thereby rendered to all genealogical, antiquarian, and historical inquirers would be so obvious as to lead a number of labourers into the same useful field. That hope bids fair to be fully realised. In Vol. iii., p. 116., we printed a letter from Mr. Peacock, announcing his intention of copying the inscriptions in the churches and churchyards of the Hundred of Manley; and we this week present our readers with three fresh communications upon the subject.

We give precedence to Miss Bockett's, inasmuch as it involves no general proposal upon the subject, but is merely expressive of that lady's willingness, in which we have no doubt she will be followed by many of her countrywomen to help forward the good work.

In your Number for Feb. 15th, I find Mr. Edward Peacock, Jun., of Bottesford Moors, Messingham, Kirton Lindsey, wishes to collect church memorials for work he intends to publish. If he would like the accounts of monuments in the immediate neighbourhood of Reading, as far as I am able it would give me pleasure to send some to him.

Julia R. Bockett.

Southcote Lodge, near Reading.

The second makes us acquainted with a plan for the publication of a Monumenta Anglicana by Mr. Dunkin,—a plan which would have our hearty concurrence and recommendation, if it were at all practicable; but which, it will be seen at a glance, must fail from its very vastness. If the Monumentarium of Exeter contains the material for half a moderate-sized octavo volume, in what number of volumes does Mr. Dunkin propose to complete his collection—even if a want of purchasers of the early volumes did not nip in the bud his praiseworthy and well-intentioned scheme?

Your correspondent Mr. Edw. Peacock, Jun, may be interested in knowing that a work has some time been projected by my friend Mr. Alfred John Dunkin of Dartford (whose industry and antiquarian learning render him well fitted for the task), under the title of Monumenta Anglicana, and which is intended to be a medium for preserving the inscriptions in every church in the kingdom. There can be no doubt of the high value and utility of such a work, especially if accompanied by a well-arranged index of names; and I have no doubt Mr. Peacock, and indeed many others of your valued correspondents, will be induced to assist in the good cause, by sending memoranda of inscriptions to Mr. Dunkin.

L. J.

Plymouth.

The following letter from the Rev. E. S. Taylor proposes a Society for the purpose:—

I for one shall be happy to co-operate with Mr. Peacock in this useful work; and I trust that, through the valuable medium of "Notes And Queries," many will be induced to offer their assistance. Could not a Society be formed for the purpose, so that mutual correspondence might take place?

E. S. Taylor.

Martham, Norfolk.

We doubt the necessity, and indeed the advisability, of the formation of any such Society.

Mr. Peacock (antÈ., p. 117.) has already wisely suggested, that "in time a copy of every inscription in every church in England might be ready for reference in our National Library," and we have as little doubt that the MS. department of the British Museum is the proper place of deposit for such records, as that the trustees would willingly accept the charge of them on the recommendation of their present able and active Keeper of the Manuscripts. What he, and what the trustees would require, would be some security that the documents were what they professed to be; and this might very properly be accomplished through the agency of such a Society as Mr. Taylor proposes, if there did not already exist a Society upon whom such a duty might very safely be devolved:—and have we not, in the greater energy which that Society has lately displayed, evidence that it would undertake a duty for which it seems pre-eminently fitted? We allude to the Society of Antiquaries. The anxiety of Lord Mahon, its president, to promote the efficiency of that Society, has recently been made evident in many ways; and we cannot doubt that he would sanction the formation of a sub-committee for the purpose of assisting in collecting and preserving a record of all existing monuments, or that he would find a lack of able men to serve on such a committee, when he numbers among the official or active Fellows of the Society gentlemen so peculiarly fitted to carry out this important national object, as Mr. Hunter, Sir Charles Young, Mr. J. Payne Collier, and Mr. Bruce.