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(p. 138) entire passages, although printed,--and doubtless writtenas prose, are really in hexameter verse. Others are absolutely in rhyme, and have very much the air of having been patched up out of ecclesiastical hymns or sequentiæ. The fact to which we have here called the reader's attention is alluded to in the Preface, (page viii. note); but we do not perceive that any inference is drawn from it.

The minor points to which we have just raised objections, can hardly be said to affect the general value of the work in any degree. It deserves a place on the shelves of every Cambrian Archæologist, and calls for an expression of our warm gratitude to the venerable antiquarian by whose care, and the excellent Society under whose auspices, it has been published.

Xisrellanrous Jotices.

ROMAN COINS.—Recently a labourer found on the island of St. Margaret, near Tenby, a small bronze coin of Constantine the Great. Obverse, CONSTANTINOPOLIS; Reverse, Victory. In exergue, T.R.P. A few years ago a coin of Constans, in a very high state of preservation was found on the same island. Obverse, D. N. CONSTANS P. F. AUG. Reverse, FEL. TEMP. REPARATIO. In the exergue, S.L.G.

LLANGATTOCK CAIRN.—The Rector of this parish, the Rev. J. Evans, B.D., a few years ago, met a man carrying human bones from a heap of stones, then being carted off from Langattock Park. He returned with him and found a cairn of considerable dimensions, in the centre of which were four large stones placed edgeways, and another on the top. Inside was part of the skull, &c., in good preservation, and apparently belonging to a man of forty or fifty years of age. A considerable quantity of fresh looking charcoal was found mixed with the bones. The Vicar immediately informed the Duke of Beaufort, then at Llangattock Park, who, with the ladies of the family, accompanied him to the cairn, and the day following, the same party with the addition of Mr. Price, of Cwmdû, visited the spot. A discussion ensued as to the probable date of the interment, the Vicar conjecturing that it was the grave of a chief who fell at the battle of Carno, in Llangattock or Llangunider, between the king of Mercia and the Britons, about the middle of the ninth century, Mr. Price maintaining that the interment had taken place a long time before the Christian era, and that the grave must have been that of a Druid. However the rains of the ensuing winter washed six coins out of the cairn, all bearing the date of Constantine except one, that representing Romulus and Remus and the wolf. The coins were sent by his Grace to Lord Northampton, and orders given for the preservation of the cairn.

Arrhæologia Cambrensis. .

NEW SERIES, No. XIX.-JULY, 1854.

THE CHURCHES OF BRECON.

(Read at Brecon.) It is a vulgar error, unnoticed, I believe, by Sir Thomas Browne, but with regard to which it has often fallen to my lot to assume his functions, that the Principality of . Wales contains nothing of any value in the department of ecclesiastical architecture. I find the mass of Englishmen entirely ignorant of Welsh buildings in the lump; and I am afraid I must add that the mass of Welshmen are hardly less so with regard to those which are not in their own immediate locality. There is many an architectural student who conceives himself to be acquainted with all the finest churches in the island, who has never taken the trouble to ascertain whether the nave of St. David's is or is not contemporary with that of Canterbury, or whether Llandaff is or is not furnished with transepts and a central tower. I have even a vivid recollection of being asked by a distinguished North Welsh antiquary, “ whether there were anything worth seeing” at the former city. To my own mind, as I have often told this Association, even the small and rude churches of Wales possess a peculiar charm, and among them we find scattered here and there buildings of which no English district need be ashamed. This is especially true of the ARCH. CAMB., NEW SERIES, VOL. V.

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place which has been chosen for the scene of our present meeting. I know of no English town of the same size which presents greater attractions to the architectural inquirer than this of Brecon. Indeed there are few cities which would not find their ecclesiological wealth palpably increased by so splendid an addition as the venerable and massive pile which looks down upon it, as if keeping town and castle alike within its sacred guardianship.

The Priory Church of Brecon is, I imagine, unquestionably the third church in Wales, and it may even put in some claim to be considered as the second. I speak of churches still perfect and used as such, so as to exclude from competition ruins like Llanthony and Tintern, the latter of which indeed can hardly be regarded as a Welsh building. The two North Welsh cathedrals I have never seen, but I suppose that neither of them can be compared to it for a moment. St. David's of course stands altogether unrivalled; but the claims of the other southern cathedral to the second place may possibly be called in question by the church of which we are now speaking. Brecon indeed has nothing to set against the wonderful union of majesty and loveliness presented by the nave and west front of Llandaff; it has indeed no west front at all, and a nave which is internally very inferior to its own eastern portions; but Brecon forms a perfect and harmonious whole, with an outline surpassed by few churches, great or small, while the beauty of Llandaff is entirely that of individual portions; to picturesqueness of outline or justness of proportion it can put forward no claim whatever. Did the town of Brecon possess only this one magnificent object, it would be enough to give it a high architectural place among towns of its own class, one which within the Principality Haverfordwest alone could venture, and that but feebly, to contest; but it contains other churches also, which, immeasurably inferior as they are to the Priory, would alone set it above most Welsh towns. The choir of Christ's College is a noble fragment, and even St. Mary's is far from devoid

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