and that the glass specimens met with were not imported but actually made on the same spot.

Mr. J. Paul Rylands, F.S.A., who has collected objects from the adjoining sand-pits and interested himself in these discoveries for many years, in discussing the above suggestion, writes :—

In 1869-70 I had 16 plates drawn in water-colours of objects found at that time at Longbank, Wilderspool; some of these objects then in the collection of the late Dr. Kendrick and the rest in my own collection, afterwards incorporated in that of Dr. Kendrick. These coloured plates are now before me.

Among the objects thus illustrated are two which seem to me to suggest that there was a Roman manufactory of coloured glass at Wilderspool; one of these is a piece of molten glass-green, blue, and white, and the other appears to be a fragment of a large crucible of buff-coloured material, having on one side (part of the interior of the crucible) a thin deposit of glaze of two colours-lapis lazuli and golden yellow.

Although it is nearly 30 years since I had this fragment in my hand, I well remember it on account of the importance I attached to its discovery.

The above letter supplies the only missing link in the chain of evidence required for proving the existence of a Roman glass manufactory at Wilderspool. The raw materials, the melting furnaces and crucibles, the finished and unfinished specimens, and waste, have all been traced and recorded, and the drawings and portable objects arranged and deposited in the Warrington Museum.

Mr. A. Hartshorne, F.S.A., Old English Glasses, p. 15, holds that since glass-making was carried on in a multitude of small furnaces throughout the Roman dominions, there is no kind of reason why the Romans should not have made it in Britain as they made it in Gaul, or why such places as Salenæ (Droitwich) in the Midlands were passed unheeded by, and their products not utilised on the spot. This suggestion equally applies to Salina (Northwich), a great salt-producing centre only 9 miles from Wilderspool.

Probably the earliest known glass-furnaces are those described and illustrated by Agricola, De Re Metallica, lib. xii, p. 470, et seq., as existing when chemistry was an empirical science and the industrial arts still in their infancy during the sixteenth century. The simplest form of furnace described by him was merely a two-storied, bee-hive-shaped brick oven, the upper chamber of which was 6 feet long, 4 feet wide, and 2 feet high, having on one side an opening, through which the ground materials were charged and a fierce fire of dry wood maintained, until the former, consisting mainly of silica and alkali, were fused into lumps of impure glass or massæ. These lumps on cooling were broken up and re-heated in fire-clay pots, 2 inches thick, 2 feet high, and 1 foot 6 inches in diameter across the bulge, which were arranged upon the "siege" or middle floor of a more elaborately constructed furnace, which is represented on plate VI, No. 2, by a photograph from one of Agricola's illustrations.

The simplest form of modern furnace, known as the "crib-furnace," which the early furnaces would probably most nearly resemble, is merely a rectangular casing of brick, through the front of which several long fire-clay cylinders, 2 inches thick and 9 or 10 inches in diameter, are inserted in a slanting position, so as to be easily accessible. Fire is introduced through a small opening at the bottom of the crib, and plays all round the crucibles until the 66 'batch," composed of pure sand, alkali, "cullet," and other ingredients in due proportion, with which they are charged, is completely fused. A draught is obtained by means of a flue from the top of the "crib" to the main chimney.

Ovens or Hypocausts.-There were two of these oval chambers enclosed in massive boulder-clay platforms, but having external fire-places, situated inside the fortified area, upon the west side, 41 feet

from the via, and 12 to 14 feet from the south wall of the long corridor. They had their roofs or vaulted covers complete, and are therefore of special interest, as illustrating the original shape of all the others which were found in a collapsed condition (except the furnace of the potter's kiln uncovered at Stockton Heath). Plans and sections of these two structures, which were supposed to be hypocausts, and also a photograph of the cross-section. of No. I, are given on plate XII, Nos. 1 and 2.

The two platforms were placed lengthwise across the east and west ends of what appeared to be the floor of a room, their surface being level with that of the floor, which was a layer, 3 to 5 inches thick, of well-pounded clay hardened by burning (opus testaceum). The approximate dimensions of the floor and chamber were 18 feet by 9 or 10 feet, but there were no indications of enclosing walls, which were probably of wood and had disappeared. The measurements of the platforms were-I (west end), length 9 feet, breadth 5 feet, depth 1 foot 8 inches; II (east end), length 9 feet 6 inches, breadth 5 feet 6 inches, depth 2 feet 10 inches. The furnace of I projected on the west side 4 feet 4 inches, its width being 3 feet 2 inches, and height I foot 6 inches; the side walls were of clay, well calcined; the cover of slabs of sandstone and limestone, the former reddened and the latter reduced to a white powder on the inside by heat. The fire-hole was I foot 10 inches wide by 1 foot 6 inches high, and the flue at the back, for carrying the heat into the enclosed chamber, length 1 foot 4 inches, breadth 10 inches, depth 6 inches. The furnace of II was entirely of clay, and extended 4 feet 6 inches from the north end of the platform, tapering, like a pig's snout, from a height and width of 5 feet to about half, with two circular flues or fire-holes, 6 inches and 8 inches in diameter respectively, passing through