31 
of Fine Arts have yielded a fragment of an inscription which 
hears some of the titles of the Emperor Hadrian. It was lying 
at the upper end of the garden, not far from the wall, about 
three feet only beneath tlie surface. It is evident, therefore, 
that the inscription had been found and wilfully fractured in 
mediaeval times. The Monks made a point of destroying, as 
idolatrous, every lettered memorial of Homan days. Some 
search was made for the remaining portions of the inscription, 
but without success. It is extremely probable that they are 
stiJl buried at the upper end of the garden, and, in some happy 
day, I trust they will be discovered. 
The earliest inscription in our Museum seems to be that of 
the standard-bearer of the ninth legion, which Dr. Hiibner 
ascribes to the first centurv after Christ. This has been so 
t/ 
much exposed to the weather for 150 j^ears that we can scarcely 
do justice now to the skill of the designer and sculptor. Our 
second inscription in point of date is the noble tablet recording 
some work executed by tlie ninth legion at the bidding of the 
Emperor Trajan. Some of the letters on this grand memorial 
are six inches long, and the whole are beautifully cut. This 
tablet was set up in the year A.D. 108-9. Our third inscription 
at York in point of date is the scanty fragment, recently 
discovered, which is as yet the only stone connecting Hadrian 
with Eburacum. He was in Britain, as we know, about the 
year A.D. 120, exciting the spleen of illnatured critics in Italy 
by the way in which he marched, bareheaded, in the front of 
his soldiers. Of course, he would visit Eburacum, and as it 
was during this visit that he began the erection of the great 
Homan wall and its stations, to which Eburacum was the depot, 
it was probable enough that he would antliorise the erection of 
various buildings in this city for the advantage of the public 
service. This fragment was, perhaps, a portion of a large 
inscription which was affixed to the front of one of these. 
A few letters alone remain to us, in two lines. They fill up 
parts of a well-known formula wliich is undoubtedly connected 
with Eladrian. The style of the letters also is that of his time. 
In the upper line are portions of the great name Trajan ; 
in the second we have AYGr* P—the last letter being the first 
