70 



be the earliest dated Churcli in England. It formed part of 

 a Benedictine Priory, founded probably about A.D. 715, and 

 existed as such till the suppression of Monasteries, in the 

 reign of Henry VIII. The Danes burnt it; Edward the 

 Confessor rebuilt it, and made it an Alien Priory, subject to 

 the Abbey of St. Denis, near Paris, After its restoration it 

 was consecrated by Ealdeed, Bishop of Worcester, in 1056. 

 About A.D. 960 a monk of this Priory became St. Alphage, 

 Archbishop of Canterbury. 



From Deerhurst a walk of a mile and a half brought the 

 party to Apperley Court, where the kind hostess had prepared 

 a goodly entertainment, to which more than fifty ladies and 

 gentlemen sat down. After dinner the President proposed the 

 health of Miss Strickland, referring to the many claims that 

 the name of Strickland has for reverence amongst ISTaturalists, 

 to the kind interest ever taken by her late father in the success 

 of the Field Club, and to the ever-honoured name of her brother, 

 Hugh Strickland, cut off by a lamentable accident in the 

 fullness of his life and talents. The President dwelt especially 

 on his labours among the drifts and gravels, and of the rare 

 prescience with which he, more than twenty-five years ago, first 

 perceived the importance of studying the facts connected with 

 these later deposits, in which at this moment the chief interest 

 of Geologists is centei-ed. 



The President then opened the business of the Meeting, by 

 reading a translation he had made from a French newspaper — 

 the Gourrier de Menton — giving an account of an entire human 

 skeleton lately found in a cave, in the neighbourhood of 

 Menton, which has given rise to much speculation as to its 

 age and history. The skeleton in question was found in a 

 cavern, buried under a bed of earth several metres in thickness, 

 in a remarkable state of preservation. The skull is described 

 as tolerably large, and of a deep brick-red colour, differing in 

 that respect from the colour of the remainder of the skeleton. 

 To the skull were found adhering an infinite number of small 

 shells, all pierced with a hole, which may have been strung on 

 the hair, or have formed portion of a head-ornament. Around 



