234 president's address. 



for the money-chest of the legionaries, it was of as early a date 

 as the days of the Emperor Hadrian, the builder of the Roman 

 "Wall. This castrum would serve to guard the mouth and right 

 bank of the Tyne. 



The Exploration Committee, aided by an enthusiastic band of 

 voluntary helpers, the pilots of the Tyne and others, have dis- 

 closed rampart-walls and streets, public and private buildings, 

 a forum or market place resembling on a smaller scale those at 

 Cilurnum (Chesters) and Pompeii, the remarkable strong chamber 

 below the level with steps leading down to it, and on the right 

 a window-sill still in situ, which is perfectly unique, with va- 

 rious associated remains of great interest and novelty. In this 

 recently-discovered Roman town, our genial guide, to whom the 

 superintendence of the excavations had evidently been a labour 

 of love, showed us where the different treasures under his charge 

 had been found. There were, as we had seen, Roman roof-tiles, 

 Saurian and Caister ware, pottery from the smother-kiln, am- 

 phora, or wine jars, and querns for preparing corn, after the 

 manner of the " two women grinding at the mill," such as is used 

 in Palestine and the East even now, bronze fibulas and brooches 

 with " safety-pins," several coins of gold, silver, and brass, of 

 various dates, three having on them the Christian or Constan- 

 tinian emblem, as Dean Stanley has now acknowledged in the 

 note to his splendid lecture on "The Early Christianity of 

 jNorthumbria,"* in which he had said at Sunderland that 

 ' ' amongst the numerous remains of the Roman Wall not one 

 Christian vestige had been found." Among other objects were 

 the keystone of an arch, with a boar's head sculptured in re- 

 lief, the mystic pine-cone, here in its stone socket, not hitherto 

 discovered, I believe, with it, the emblem of fire and of the vital 

 flame to the ancient Assyrian and Palmyrene as well as to the 

 Roman, and the mural monument with the imperfect inscription 

 from which, compared with another on a tile, some consider that 

 the garrison of this strong station, Ad Tinam, was the fifth Cohort 

 of the Gauls. I was personally interested in two relics that 

 seemed to imply a pre-historic ■ occupation of the same site, a 



* " Good Words," 1875, p. 246. 



