The Report. 38 
incur any extraordinary expense in the way of exploration, restora- 
tion, or otherwise, as we are often invited and sometimes expected 
to do. 
“‘The Library and Museum have been enriched with many 
donations, several of which are of great value, as illustrating the 
topography, antiquities, and natural history of the county. Detailed 
lists of these donations are given at the end of each number of the 
Magazine. For these the Committee desires cordially to thank all 
the contributors, and at the same time to remind the Members of 
the Society scattered all over the county how great is the importance 
of preserving in some Museum, whether at Devizes, Salisbury, or 
Marlborough, objects which, when scattered and in private hands, 
are of little value, but are of the highest interest when collected, 
classified, and arranged for purposes of observation and study. The 
Committee has again to report very important work carried out by the 
munificence and under the personal superintendence and direction of 
the accomplished archzologist,General Pitt-Rivers,whose excavations 
at Bokerly Dyke, in the extreme south of the county, were recorded 
in the Report last year. This year the General acceded to the 
urgent request of the Secretaries, and made a large section through 
Wansdyke, a little to the north of Old Shepherd’s Shore. This 
section was scientifically cut under the immediate eye of the General 
and his three clerks, by a body of a dozen or more labourers, who 
carried on the work for a fortnight in the spring of this year, when, 
unfortunately, the weather was exceptionally cold and the wind 
more than ordinarily keen and cutting. Though nothing was found 
to indicate the exact date of the throwing up of the Wansdyke, the 
discovery of some fragments of Samian ware on the original surface 
of the down beneath the ramparts, in addition to the finding of an 
iron knife and an iron nail, and the position in which these relics 
were respectively found, proved to the satisfaction of all who ex- 
amined them that the work was not pre-Roman, as had generally 
-been supposed. But whether Roman or post-Roman (possibly even 
Saxon) there is no evidence as yet to show. We rejoice, however, 
to add that General Pitt-Rivers is not satisfied that the evidence is 
exhausted, and proposes shortly to make further examination into 
B 2 
