I have ventured to lay before scholars a new system of decipherment of the Hittite hieroglyphic inscriptions, based on a study of those already published, and those which were found during the season of 1911, when I was employed by the Trustees of the British Museum on the excavations at Carchemish. The Trustees have most kindly given me permission to quote from these new texts of 1911 as far as is necessary to prove my system of decipherment and grammar, even to the names of the petty chiefs which occur in them, and they have asked only that I shall refrain from discussing the historical side of their inscriptions, so that their own priority of publication at a later date be not anticipated. I wish therefore to thank them for a concession which I fully appreciate.

I have ventured to bring the documents which form the subject-matter of this paper to the notice of the Society because they seem to suggest a possible source of material to any one who may have a mind to be the future historian of the iron industry of the Weald. Due attention has already been paid to the later and more distinguished period of the history of that industry, and we are now able to form a fair idea of its extent and the processes in use, after the discovery of the art of casting and the subsequent employment of the works, in the production of the iron ordnance of the kingdom, had made it something more than of mere local importance. For the earlier period, when casting was not, our knowledge of the industry must probably remain imperfect, but that it may possibly be a little less vague than it is at present will, I hope, appear from the evidence which I now produce.

Recent excavations made within the church of St. Bartholomew the Great, exposing the sites of the first Lady chapel and of the south side chapel, have thrown new light on the plan of Rahere's church; and excavations on the south side of the church have uncovered the foundations of the sacristy, chapter-house, and the Prior's house. The object of this paper is to lay the results of these excavations before the Society.

One of the finest gravel-pits in the world for flint implements is in process of extinction, and a final opportunity has been given for studying its stratification with a view to classifying, however roughly, the thousands of specimens from this site that have passed into public and private collections both at home and abroad. Every collector is familiar with the name of Swanscombe, a village on the south bank of the Thames between Dartford and Gravesend, and many have procured implements from the workmen on the spot without realizing to the full the necessity of fixing the horizon of each, if their purchases are to be of scientific value.

It would be foreign to the purpose of my paper to enter upon the much debated and still unsolved question as to who were the Iberians and from whence they came, nor, indeed, has that question any direct bearing upon the subject-matter with which I deal. A few words as to the state of the country during the period under review, the organization of the peoples who inhabited it, their physical and moral conditions, and the influence of their surroundings upon their practice and methods in war and in strife may, however, not be out of place.

It is well known that early in the reign of Hadrian a wall was built across Britain from the Solway to near the mouth of the Tyne, and that about twenty years later, under Antoninus Pius, another wall was built still further north, from the Clyde to the Forth. Forty years before the wall of Hadrian, Agricola, in the early years of the reign of Domitian, penetrated even further than the line of the Antonine wall. It is with the period from the first advance of Agricola until the coming of Hadrian that the following paper deals.

During the history of Art, from the earliest times to the present day, certain pigments have remained common to the artist's palette, and while some have dropped out of use, others have been added. Although a great deal of information on the subject has been collected from the examination of old records, and, in addition, by the occasional analysis of the actual pigments used, the whole subject seems to me to be deserving of a more exact inquiry than it has as yet received.

Since last I had the honour to report upon the work of excavation, which for several years past has been carried on in the cavern at Wookey Hole, considerable progress has been made, the excavation being completed as far as the door of the cave. In doing this, a great quantity of floor débris has been minutely examined, and some very interesting finds have been made.

Bess of Hardwick's building accounts are stored in the muniment room at Hardwick: in regard to Chatsworth they are fragmentary; in regard to Hardwick they are almost complete; in regard to other works they survive but in scattered references. Of the buildings themselves Chatsworth has almost entirely disappeared, the earlier building at Hardwick is partially demolished, the newer building remains almost as Bess left it; while her other minor works remain only in portions. Thus the buildings and the accounts are commentaries on each other, and fate has decreed that the measure of their survival should be equal.

The once rich and mitred abbey of Malmesbury has provided a subject for many writers, and the remains of its church a model for artists and draughtsmen, but no one seems to have combined description and drawing to explain the history of this building. The writer, having been engaged professionally for many years upon the repairs of the church, has had exceptional opportunities for the study of the structure, and although much of necessity has been said before, some little fresh matter has been brought to light.

Before beginning my report on recent excavations I must, with great regret, express on behalf of the Committee and of all connected with the Caerwent Exploration Fund the great and irreparable loss we have sustained by the decease of its President, Viscount Tredegar, F.S.A. From the beginning, in 1899, to the end, his Lordship had been one of the most enthusiastic and the most generous of our supporters. To him was largely due the success of the exploration, and without his aid it is doubtful whether it could have been undertaken. We have also lost by death since the date of the last Report another of our most valued supporters, Lord Llangattock, F.S.A., who was one of our Vice-presidents, and had taken much interest in the work, especially during its early years.

Hardham Priory, Pulborough, Sussex, the property of Lord Charles Beresford, was destroyed by fire on May 16, 1912. A wooden beam in the brickwork of a modern chimney was the cause of the outbreak, by which the farmhouse was entirely destroyed.