xlviii. 



subject of coin collections the author considered that wider power should 

 be given to those who had charge of coin departments in dealing with 

 those who wished to exchange or purchase duplicates. Attention was 

 drawn to the number of discrepancies and omissions in Hutchins' History 

 of Dorset, the author having marked no less than 80 in his own copy. As 

 an instance of the increased interest taken of late in these tokens of the 

 17th century, Mr. Udal stated that whilst Boyne in 1858 records 141 tokens 

 only he had been able by the addition of fresh examples to bring the 

 number to 219. 



A conversation followed on the subject of the paper. 



Mr. Kemp-Welch's paper on the "Great Earwig" was then read 

 by the Treasurer, and Dr. Wake Smart's paper, "An Analysis of 

 the Celtic Tumuli of Dorset, by Charles Warne, Esq., F.S.A.," in 

 the absence of the writer, was entrusted to the Secretary to read. 

 It consisted of an exhaustive criticism of Warne's Book, divisible 

 roughly into two parts. The former was a classification of 160 

 Tumuli described in the work, with a view to show the relative proportion 

 of cremation to inhumation in northern, central, and southern Dorset. The 

 latter portion of the paper was a classification and description of the 

 various kinds of relics found in the tumuli of the three districts. Owing 

 to the length of the whole paper it was considered advisable to read only 

 the first portion, reserving the latter part until the next meeting of the 

 Society. For purposes of comparison the County was divided into three 

 divisions, the south extending from the coast to the river Frome, central 

 from the Frome to the Stour, and north from the Stour to Bockley Dyke. 

 The character of the interments in the various barrows was referred to, 

 with this general inference, that the practice of burning the body and 

 depositing the calcined bones, whether in earthenware vases, or, more 

 simply, in cists or graves dug in the soil, or by heaping the remains of the 

 funeral pile on the surface of the soil and covering them with earth, was 

 more in vogue in the sera when these tumuli were raised, than the 

 alternative practice of burying the body without subjecting it to the 

 action of fire ; still it is shown that this older custom still prevailed along 

 with the other in the Bronze age. The predominance of cremation was 

 attested by the contents of 121 of the tumuli, showing a difference of 30 

 per cent, between the two modes of the disposal of the dead in favour of 

 the practice of cremation. The division of the County into three districts 

 served to bring out the fact that the custom of burying the body unburnt 

 prevailed much in the south, less so in the central, and still less in the 

 north. There was a decreasing ratio from south to north. In the north 

 cremation marked about 74 per cent., inhumation about 26 per cent., 



