Obituary.

JOHN THOMAS MOULD, F.R.C.S.

Born November 27th, 1817; died October 10th, 1899.

MR. MOULD was born at Oundle, Northamptonshire. He was the eldest son of Mr. John Mould, a well-known medical man, and grandson on the mother's side of Dr. Arthur Mackie, of Huntingdon. His father died when he was very young, leaving two other children—a son who died in early life, and a daughter, who married the Rev. David Royce, Vicar of Lower Swell, Gloucestershire, a well-known antiquarian. After his mother's second marriage, Mr. Mould was brought up and educated under the care of his stepfather, the Rev. Felix Laurent, Vicar of Saleby, Lincolnshire. He commenced his medical education at Nottingham, and went from there to St. George's Hospital. He passed his examinations in 1840, becoming Member of the Royal College of Surgeons, and commenced practice at once in Brompton, now South Kensington, where he remained until his death. He became Fellow of the College in 1856. He took great interest in all the medical charities, was an active Governor of St. George's Hospital, was on the Council and Vice-president of Epsom College, Chairman of the Committee of the British Medical Benevolent Fund, and Vice-president of the Society for the Relief of Widows and Orphans of Medical Men. He was an earnest Churchman, and was for forty-three years vicar's churchwarden of Brompton Church, and for many years Treasurer of the schools.

He took great interest in the Volunteer movement, and was an active member in its earlier years. He was also Treasurer and Vice-president of the Sydenhain Club for some years.

His connection with the British Archæological Association, in which he always took the greatest interest, commenced in 1866, and, as long as his health permitted, he was a constant attendant at the meetings and congresses. Though he was not himself a contributor to the pages of the Journal, he would often bring articles of interest for exhibition.

Antiquarian Intelligence.

A History of Oxfordshire (Popular County History Series). By J. MEADE FALKNER. (London: Elliot Stock, 7s. 6d.)—This is the latest addition to Mr, Stock's series of County Histories, and it more than sustains the reputation which the Series has already gained, not only from the intrinsic interest of the subject, but also from the bright and easy manner in which it is dealt with by the author. Mr. Falkner is well qualified for his task, having already edited Murray's "Handbook to Oxfordshire ;" and as we follow him from the dimness of prehistoric times down to our own day, we feel that we are in the company of a thoroughly competent guide.

To a far greater extent than is the case with Cambridge (which was dealt with in the last volume issued), Oxfordshire is Oxford, and Oxford is the University.

In Roman and pre-Roman times the county was a land of wood and water, swamps and mists, with clearings and settlements in the forests, and camps in suitable positions, such as Dorchester, Alchester, etc., but none was near the site of Oxford. The earliest mention of this place is in the A.-S. Chronicle, under the year 912, when, we are told : "King Eadward took possession of London and Oxford" on the death of Eathered, husband of his sister Ethelfleda, the Lady of the Mercians, to whose territory the latter till then belonged. Of the subsequent growth of the city, of the building of the castle by Robert d'Oily in the time of the Conqueror, of the ecclesiastical establishments, of the rise of the University, of the long drawn-out conflict in which the town steadily lost and the University steadily won, of the founding of college after college, of Oxford as the abode of royalty and the centre of political life of all this Mr. Falkner gives a clear and interesting account. We think also that the reason he assigns for the building of a city in Saxon times on the hitherto unoccupied site of Oxford, viz., the fact that it lay on the march between Wessex and Mercia, and was therefore of military importance, is very true; and this, together with its central position, would also account for the favour in which it was held by royalty, for the holding of Parliaments there, and finally for the choice of the city as the seat of a university.

earliest ;

The first mention of Oxford being in 912, it will be seen that Mr. Falkner is among those who refuse to assign any of the honour of having founded the University to Alfred; and rightly, for, as a matter of fact, the first beginnings of the University, which was originally nothing more than a guild, or trades union of teachers and students settled at Oxford, do not go further back than to the time of Henry I, Beauclerk (the fine scholar) at the and the first teachers were probably monks and friars. actual origin of the University is wrapped in obscurity, and is, indeed, a good example of the way in which the British Empire and the British Constitution have grown : "there was no charter of incorporation, and no definite date at which it can be said the University was founded; everything was done haphazard, and the complete fabric grew."

But the

But though much is naturally said about Oxford and the University, this is a County History, and Mr. Falkner does not forget it. No Oxfordshire man can accuse the author of having omitted anything of importance; while the antiquary and historian will find him, as we said above, a safe and competent guide. Very few misprints disfigure this book-there is one on p. 74, l. 7, viz., 1729 for 1279.

The History of the Castle, Town, and Port of Dover. By the Rev. S. P. H. STATHAM, Rector of St. Mary-in-the-Castle (London: Longmans and Co., 10s. 6d.)-- Mr. Statham is the fourth clerical historian of the important military post and port of Dover: his predecessors having been Prebendary Darell, in the sixteenth century, Rev. J. Lyon, author of The History of the Town and Port of Dover, and Canon Puckle, who wrote on The Church and Fortress of Dover Castle. The present author's subject includes those of his two immediate predecessors, but notwithstanding this he contrives to pack all that is essential into this handy volume of 450 pages.

The first nine chapters of the book carry the history of the town and port from the earliest times down to the present day, and in these we can trace the process of development by which the Roman port and station became the Saxon and Norman fortress and chief town of the Cinque Ports; until, after centuries of military greatness, w、 ste it the principal centre of communication with the Continent to-day.

Dover, from its position, fronting the Continent at a distance of only 20 miles, was always marked out for military rather than commercial importance, so the Castle not only actually but ideally dominates the town; still, the history of the latter is interesting enough. Mr. Statham gives grounds for believing that the town already possessed

1899

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a charter in the days of the Confessor; and while he dwells as little as possible upon its connection with the Cinque Ports (Mr. Burrows having already dealt with that subject), but treats rather of Dover as a distinct entity, he cannot avoid mention of the herring fishery which it shared with its compeers-Sandwich, Romney, Hythe and Hastings, Rye and Winchelsea being added later. This led to its association with Great Yarmouth, where its fishermen originally occupied the present site of that town as a drying-ground for their nets, and where, later on, its barons possessed civic rights; while, as the east coast town grew, quarrels arose which were only finally appeased by the severance of all connection in the seventeenth century.

Mr. Statham holds that the town itself was not walled until quite the end of the thirteenth century, deducing from the facts of the French raid in 1295 that it must have been unwalled then. The earliest notice of a "wall-tax" is shortly after this event, which was in all probability the cause of the citizens desiring more protection for themselves than the Castle afforded. The growth and development of the port is noticeable throughout the Middle Ages, and the need of improved harbour accommodation was as much felt then as now. Already, in the time of Edward I, the passenger traffic between England and the Continent by way of Dover was a source of considerable profit, and not a few quarrels in the town.

The tenth chapter is devoted to the local "religious establishments," including the churches, of which a full and interesting account is given. Of these the most important was St. Martin's, originally the seat of the priory, until that was removed in consequence of scandals, in the reign of Henry I, to a distance, and rebuilt as St. Mary and St. Martin's Newark (new work). The old church (old in 1180) was and remained remarkable, not only from the fact that it was subject to no authority, diocesan or otherwise, save that of the archbishops alone, but also because it actually combined no less than three parish churches within its walls. No vestige of this church now remains.

A full, and on the whole accurate, account of the history and present condition of the buildings connected with the priory and of the other ecclesiastical buildings in the town, follows. It is interesting to note that the church of St. Peter, of which also every vestige long ago disappeared, was used from a very early period by the barons of Dover-as the freemen of the port were styled, because they held their lands collectively as a barony from the King-for the place of election of their mayor; the first recorded took place in 1367, and the last in 1581, but it is probable the habit was already ancient in 1367.

The history and description of the Castle and its officers leaves

nothing to be desired, and is an eloquent testimony to Mr. Statham's indefatigable industry: one very important fact, which has been derived from independent search of the Pipe Rolls, being the erection of the keep between the years 1182 and 1188, as against the date 1153 accepted by Mr. Clark for Dover, and 1180 assigned by the same writer as that of the latest rectangular keep. When, however, we come to the author's account of the church of St. Mary-in-the-Castle, of which he is rector, we are afraid we must regretfully part company with him. The position of this ancient church with the Roman Pharos -used in medieval days as a bell-tower-alongside, is well known and need not be enlarged upon. The point which Mr. Statham, with admirable ingenuity, labours to prove is that the four walls of the tower were originally solid, and formed with the nave and the Pharos part of the Roman fortress erected in the first century A.D.; that these walls were subsequently pierced for arches, and the building turned into a Christian church some time in the fourth century, when the chancel and transepts would be added; and that "it remains, therefore, not only a monument of the Roman workman's skill, but as the oldest building in Britain still standing which has been, and yet is, used for divine worship." Now, we have naturally every sympathy with Mr. Statham's laudable wish to be the rector of the oldest church in Britain, and one that not only connects its incumbent with the preSaxon Romano-British Church, but also with the actual conquerors of the age of Claudius, and we should be only too pleased if the facts were in favour of the idea; but, apart from the almost certain conclusion that the Romans never had a fortress on the Castle Hill, there being no necessity for it in view of the friendliness of the opposite shore, and that they built nothing on it beyond the Pharos, and perhaps another tower now destroyed, we are bound to say that the author's conclusions are based on insufficient premisses. We have carefully compared all that Mr. Statham deduces, with the statements of his authorities: Canon Puckle, who saw the foundations laid bare at the time of the restoration by Sir G. Scott, and those of Sir G. Scott's clerk of the works, together with all that is adduced on other grounds in favour of its Roman origin by Mr. L. Brock, the late Hon. Sec. of this Association, and we are bound to confess that the conclusion we come to is that the earliest part of the church is, as Sir G. Scott, Mr. Micklethwaite, and other eminent architects maintain, of Saxon date and workmanship.

The last chapter of the book contains a full list of the Constables of the Castle. Mr. Statham has gone to the Pipe Rolls for himself, and has found that the generally accepted list is, in its latter portion,