118 THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
absolutely dry, all perishable articles—hair braid, fishing lines, wooden utensils—
are just as perfectly preserved as the stone arrow-heads, earthenware whorls and 
pottery of the collection.
One case contains portions of very large rude but ingeniously made urns of
coarse pottery, found locally, the style and manner of ornamentation of which sug-
gest that they may be of the period of the chambered cairns of North Britain. We
have no stone in Essex, so that chambered cairns would be an impossibility with
us ; but these urns exactly resemble those described and figured in Anderson's
"Rhind Lectures," found by him and others in the wonderfully-constructed cairns
of Caithness and elsewhere in the far north.
Mr. Acland pointed out the progress he was making in getting together series
of specimens illustrating the development and variation from rude types of objects
of domestic and social use—a subject in which he takes great interest, and which
is so thoroughly worked out in General Pitt-Rivers' magnificent collection, now at
Oxford.
Natural history is not a prominent feature in the museum, and, indeed, is some-
what incongruous with the avowed objects of the Essex Archaeological Society.
The local specimens are very few in number. Close to the entrance is a case
illustrating oyster culture and growth—from the first fall of the spat to the time
when the bivalves are ready for the market. One specimen is remarkable and
puzzling. A good sized crab was taken alive—on his back are oysters not less
than six or seven years old. They were alive also at the time the crab was taken,
and it is quite evident, therefore, that this particular crab, contrary to the usual
habit, had not changed his shell for at least six years.
The corridor contains the collection of shells given to the Corporation by the late
J. T. Ambrose, of Mistley, which were arranged by Dr. Bree, and the Yelloly
Watson series of ores and minerals, both of which are well worthy of examination,
but they are, of course, not of a local character. The latter collection is specially
good. It contains specimens of the ores of various metals as they appear in the
market. They are arranged in accordance with the plan adopted at the Museum
of Practical Geology in Jermyn Street. Mr. Yelloly Watson's position in the
mining world gave him unusual facilities for getting the specimens, and he took
great pleasure in increasing this collection, so as to make it as perfect as
possible.
In a room below the general level of the museum is a large and varied collec-
tion of remains of Crag mammals, all dredged up in the North Sea. They were
got together by the late Dr. Bree, and several of the specimens are of greater
interest to the local naturalist than the other portions of the museum.
As Mr. Acland said, the museum is sadly in want of increased space and
increased funds so as to allow of the expansion of the collections, which could
be readily made if these necessary conditions were existent. If any funds had
been available for the purchase of such finds as have been brought to light in the
course of the last fifty years, Colchester Museum would have had the finest collec-
tion of Roman antiquities in the country. Such, however, has not been the case,
and many museums, public and private, with their specimens from Colchester,
bear witness to the fact. It is much to be feared that Mr. George Joslin's
unique gathering of antiquities illustrating the religious, social, and domestic life
of the colonists of Camulodunon during four centuries of Roman occupation, will be
allowed to pass away from the town and county to which it should certainly belong,
owing to the difficulty of raising the money necessary to secure it. But it would