178 THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
The Rev. M. W. Manthorp, of S, Empress Avenue, South Wanstead,
E.12.
Mr. John Avery exhibited a fine series of old prints and water-colour
drawings of Barking, some 50 in all, from his own collection,
Miss G. Lister, F.L.S., exhibited a series of skins of Wagtails of various
species and races, together with some water-colour sketches and maps to
illustrate the geographical distribution of the various races.
Mr. Clifford Hart exhibited a set of eleven paintings on silk of various
Birds.
Mr. Percy Thompson exhibited the British "Trap-door Spider," Atypus
affinis, and its silken tube, found at Highbeach at the Club's Cryptogamic
foray in the previous November, which specimens had been prepared for
exhibition in the Museum : Mr. Hugh Main, F.E.S., added some remarks
on the exhibit.
Thanks were accorded to the various exhibitors.
The Curator appealed to Members for gifts of prints, drawings, or
photographs to enrich the Club's Pictorial Survey of Essex.
The President called upon Mr. Thomas W. Reader, F.G.S., who de-
livered a Lecture on "Caves, Caverns and Grottoes," which he illustrated
by some. 100 lantern photographs. Mr. W. Whitaker, B.A., F.R.S., made
some appreciative remarks on the character of the photographs shown,
and a hearty vote of thanks to the Lecturer was passed by acclamation,
VISIT TO THE GUILDHALL, CITY OF LONDON
(511th MEETING).
SATURDAY, JIST FEBRUARY, 1920.
On the above date the Club visited the Guildhall and its Museum,
under the direction of our Member, Mr. Frank Lambert, M.A., the Assistant
Curator: over 40 Members attended.
Before the party inspected the. building, Mr. Lambert gave a short
lecture on its history, illustrated (with the kind permission of the Librarian),
by a selection from the valuable collection of London prints in the possess-
ion of the Guildhall Library. Of the earliest Hall, he said, we know
nothing, except that it stood in Aldermanbury, to the west of the present
site. The Hall now standing was begun in 1411, but chiefly because of
financial difficulties was not completed till a generation later. In 1422
and 1423, the executors of Richard Whittington contributed to the paving
and glazing of the Hall, and in 1425 the porch was built. So the Hall
stood till the Great Fire of 1666, when the open roof was so badly injured
that it had to be removed and was replaced by a flat ceiling, which was
intended to be temporary. At the same time the walls were raised some
twenty feet, and the interior of the porch was re-built. The front of the
Hall underwent another great change a century later, for in 1789 it was
again re-built in the present rather grotesque fashion by George Dance,
then City Architect. The last important change in the structure was made
in 1864, when Sir Horace Jones removed the flat ceiling and built an open
roof in the style of, but differing in detail from, the original. He also planned
a new front to Guildhall Yard, and actually pulled down the eastern