We alighted and passed into the enclosure. I could just see the head of a labouring man, who was delving away in a long trench. Sitting on the side of the trench was a figure dressed in black, his gaitered legs

disappearing in the pit. Those who remember Landseer's picture of "Suspense" a Scotch terrier watching at a rat-hole will be able to appreciate the whole look and attitude of that figure as the pick broke into every fresh lump of earth. Leaving my human terrier for a moment, still watching at his hole, I clambered over the mounds of earth, and looked down at the dead bones of Roman Britain. The old wall above ground had been the starting point from which the excavations were commenced, and it was soon discovered that it was the above-ground portion of a large building in the form of a parallelogram, divided into three compartments; the middle one being 226 feet long and 30 feet wide, the side aisles, if we may so term them, being of exactly the same length, but one only 14 feet wide, and the other 13 feet 9 inches wide at one end and 16 feet at the other. The middle compartment is paved with brick in the herring-bone pattern, but portions of tesselated floors were found at the eastern extremity of the northern lateral chamber. This place is nothing less than a stone puzzle to the archæologists. Apparently, it was not roofed in, as few tiles were found in the area. That it stood in the angle formed by the intersection of two streets is clearly ascertained, and that it was entered from both of them is equally clear. Along its western façade ran the great Roman military highway which connected London with Chester, still in use and known under the Saxon name of Watling Street. That this road expanded into a wide space opposite the main western entrance there can be no doubt, for it has

been traced for some distance, until fresh buildings impinge upon the way, and considerably narrow it.

Along the northern side of this building ran another street joining the Watling Street wall at right angles; wherever excavations have been made in its course the pick has come down upon a surface pitched with large pebbles. The Roman streets, it is clear, were formed like those of Shrewsbury, and scores of others. in Britain to this day. What public purpose this building could have served is, however, a matter of the merest conjecture. It has been suggested that it formed the forum, for the reason that it is very similar in form to the remains of the forum found at Pompeii. A curious piece of ironwork, somewhat in the form of a trident, which fitted into a staff, apparently some emblem of office, was found in its principal area.

At present, however, a veil has been drawn over the subject in the shape of a flourishing field of turnips, the Committee of Excavation hitherto having to manipulate their limited plot of ground somewhat as Paddy did his insufficient blanket, by filling up one place in order to expose another. Consequently, the only portion of this debateable building at present open to view is the portion of old wall originally above ground. This weather-beaten fragment bears upon its southern face evidence of having been connected with other buildings, for the springings of three brick arches are very plainly visible upon it, and the spade of the excavator has traced out the underground walls that supported them. Here evidently three "barrel roofed" rooms, possibly granaries, existed, as in one of them a

quantity of charred wheat was found. Trenching southward soon proved that they had only opened but a small portion of some great central building of the city, for the spade at some considerable depth struck upon the semicircular end of a wall, and speedily a fine hypocaust, 37 feet long and 25 feet wide, was laid open. The Romans, it may be stated, in this country at least, did not warm their apartments by open fireplaces or stoves, but by hot air chambers built underneath the ground-floors, which were supported at short intervals by rows of pillars formed of square tiles placed one upon another. Here, then, was the grand heating apparatus of a very fine room delved out of the earth in almost as perfect a state as when Roman fires circulated through it. The pillars of tiles were in perfect order, and the soot still adhered to their sides. as though the smoke had only passed through them yesterday. In the same line a number of other smaller hypocausts were soon exhumed. Here and there the floors of small apartments paved with the herringbone pavement are seen, and in one spot the walls of a sweating-room are still lined with the flues used to warm them, consisting of the common pottery tiles with flanged edges, employed by the Romans for roofing to this day. Passages floored with indestructible

* We regret to state, that during a temporary stoppage of the works, several inroads of the barbarians in the shape of "cheap trippers" took place, in which these pillars were wantonly thrown down; they have since been restored to their old position by the careful hand of Dr. Johnson. We are sorry to say, however, that the only bit of the wall-inscription yet found in these ruins, was by these later barbarians entirely destroyed.

concrete lead between these rooms, and in some places the plaster still adheres to the walls, painted either in bands of red and yellow, or arranged in patterns of not inelegant design. In one place the wall is tesselated, an embellishment which is, we believe, quite unique. There is evidence also that the outsides of some of the buildings in Uriconium were plastered and painted, as the semicircular end of the large hypocaust when discovered was so finished. Similar external embellishments were discovered at Pompeii. What

we may term the stoke-hole of one of these hypocausts remains still intact. Three steps, formed out of single slabs of stone, sharp almost as the day they came from the stone-dresser's hands, lead to an arched opening of splendid workmanship, which directly communicates with the hot-air chamber. I could almost fancy I saw the Roman stoker shovelling in the wood and coal (for coal has been discovered here) some biting December morning, to keep life in the shivering centurion pacing above. Near this stoke-hole there was found an ash-heap-a Romano-British ash-heap!

Imagine, good reader, Macaulay's New Zealander, after taking his survey of the ruins of St. Paul's from the broken arch of London Bridge, kicking his foot by accident against a London ash-heap, and you will perhaps be able to realize the eagerness of the Shrewsbury archæologists. Here were discovered, as was expected, numberless unconsidered trifles, but of priceless worth, as illustrating the every-day life of the inhabitants. Fragments of pottery, broken by the Roman" cat," or "come to pieces in the hand,"