overgrown brickyard near the Column; and owing to the damp wet spring the pink fruits were still in the last mentioned locality on the 4th May,

1920.

Graphis scripta (Ach.).-7. Common on beech in Savernake Forest; the narrow black and generally curved lirellae or fructifications of this lichen are singularly like scribblings with pen and ink, whence the generic and specific names. G. elegans (Ach.).--7. Fine and conspicuous on trees in Rhododendron Drive and rather common in other parts of Savernake Forest, where the Graphidaceae, the natural order to which this lichen belongs, are well represented; var parallella (Leighton).-7. On a birch near Rhodendron Drive; in this var. the apothecia are arranged in a parallel manner. G. sophistica (Nyl.).-7. Occasionally on trees in

Savernake Forest.

Phaeographis inusta (Muel.).—7. On a beech in the Grand Avenue and not uncommon on trees near Rhododendron Drive and elsewhere in the Forest.

Opegrapha vulgata (Ach.).—7. On beeches near the Grand Avenue; the thallus is reddish in this lichen. O. herpetica (Ach.).—7. Common on beeches in Savernake Forest and often infested with a black fungus.

Arthonia astroidea var. Swartziana (Nyl.).—7. On the smooth bark of young trees in London Ride and also near Rhododendron Drive in Savernake Forest; probably not uncommon. The type is also not infrequent on young smooth-barked trees near Great Bedwyn.

Stigmatidium crassum (Duby.). 7. A spermogoniferous lichen from a beech near Ramsbury was, in the absence of spores, doubtfully referred by Mr. Paulson to this plant.

Verrucaria nitida (Schrad.).—7. Beech in Column Ride, Tottenham Park and several other localities in the Forest. V. epidermidis (Ach.)—7. Beech near Column Ride, Tottenham Park; Mr. Paulson wrote:-"The lichen has neither spores nor paraphyses and the whole perithecium (fructification) is collapsed; it is probably V. epidermidis (Ach.), I can only feel really certain when the spores are present."

Although this paper is not concerned with Freshwater Algae, the occurrence of the two following interesting species near Great Bedwyn may be noted:

Trentepohlia aurea. 7. This sub-aerial alga formed an orange crust on the east side of the low stone parapet which surrounds the Column in Tottenham Park, and also occurred sparingly on trees near Rhododendron Drive; Mr. F. A. Brokenshire, of Barnstaple, says it is found on trees, rocks, gates, etc., where open to currents of moist air, and I have seen it on stonework at Virginia Water and on rocks at Ilfracombe; at the latter place the orange coloration of the rocks, both inland and on the coast, was very vivid and conspicuous.

Botrydium granulatum (L.). (Grev.).-7,8 In the chinks of drying mud of a small pond near Chisbury Wood, Great Bedwyn; also on mud by a dewpond on the chalk downs near Tidcombe; Mr. A. Gepp, of the British Museum, kindly sent me the following interesting note on this alga :“Botrydium granulatum is a remarkable unicellular but multinucleate alga -a coenyte; green and pyriform above and emitting rhizoids below-but

all are parts of one cell. It is reproduced asexually in a number of ways according to external conditions-broadly by zoogonidia and by aplanospores. G. S. West (British Freshwater Algae) says it is very local." It is widely distributed in our islands, but conditions are not often suitable for its appearance above ground; it occurs almost exclusively on drying mud -in ponds or on mud thrown out from a canal, and is not uncommon on chalk mud but the nature of the mud does not matter." The naked eye appearance of this curious plant is roughly expressed by saying that it resembles small pale-green globules clustered together on the surface of the mud, which description will, I hope, enable our readers to recognize it, should they chance to come across it.

WILTSHIRE NEWSPAPERS-PAST AND PRESENT, Part III. (Continued).1

THE NEWSPAPERS OF SOUTH WILTS.

By MRS. HERBERT RICHARDSON, B.A., sometime Scholar of St. Hugh's College, Oxford.

Section 2-THE OLDEST EXISTING WILTSHIRE NEWSPAPER-The Salisbury, and Winchester Journal (1729-present day).

The oldest existing Wiltshire newspaper, The Salisbury and Winchester Journal, has a history of much interest to the student of the early provincial press. It dates indubitably from the year 1736, and there is the strongest evidence for assigning its inception to the year 1729.

As in the case of other provincial newspapers with a claim to more than a hundred years' continuous existence, the data provided by extant early issues are, unfortunately, scanty. No Salisbury paper seems to have appeared between 1716, when Farley's Salisbury Post Man presumably came to an end, and 1729, when what is sometimes erroneously referred to as the "First Salisbury Journal" was originally issued; certainly none exist. In 1729, however, the enterprise of a Salisbury newspaper was again taken up, this time with more prospect of success, as its promoter was a local bookseller and not, as Samuel Farley had been, a printer-errant with no real stake in the city.

It was probably at the end of May or beginning of June, 1729, that The Salisbury Journal for the first time appeared. The date is arrived at by the not entirely reliable method of counting back from an available number, for of this early issue of the paper (as in the case of The Salisbury Postman) one copy only exists. This is Number LVIII.,3 for Monday, July 6th, 1730. It is a small

1 For Parts I. and II., by Mr. J. J. Slade, and Section 1 of Part III., by Mrs. Richardson, see Wilts Arch. Mag., xl., pp. 37-74, 129-141, 318–351. 2 See Part III., Section 1, of Wiltshire Newspapers-Past and Present. 3 In the possession of the proprietors of The Salisbury and Winchester Journal.

quarto publication, measuring 12 in. by 9 in., containing four pages, and printed on a very coarse handmade paper with no apparent watermark. Its title runs :—

"Numb. LVIII. / The Salisbury Journal / Containing the most Material Occurrences both Foreign and Domestick / Monday, July 6, 1730."

And the heading shows a rough but attractive woodcut view of the city, flanked on the one side by the arms of New Sarum and on the other by a monogram, W.C. and B.C. intertwined. At the bottom of the front page is "(Price Two Pence)," and at the foot of the last. the endorsement, Sarum: printed by Charles Hooton, at the Printing Office in Milford Street, where all Sorts of Printing Business are done after the best Manner at Reasonable Rates."

The contents comprise news from London, Scotland, Ireland, and the English counties, with paragraphs from Calais, Milan, the Hague (there is special mention of "our Hague letter "), and even from Boston and St. Christopher's; and the usual lists of Marriages, Deaths, Preferments and Bankrupts, with the Bills of Mortality for London and Westminster, and the Prices of goods "at BearKey" and at Salisbury. There is no local news, and few local advertisements besides those of Hooton, the printer, and of the two booksellers, William Collins and Edward Easton. The paper closes with the following rather pathetic postscript:-"N.B. This Paper not being encouraged according to Expectation, I shall from this time decline it; but all other Printing Business will be perform'd after the best Manner By Yours, etc., Charles Hooton."

This earliest known number of The Salisbury Journal thus provides rather fully the necessary data for its own history. It had run apparently for fifty-eight numbers, and, as far as one can rely on the method of numbering back, probably dated from May 25th, 1729. Its promoter was William Collins, a bookseller carrying on business at the Bible and Crown in Silver Street, whose proprietorship is confirmed by the monogram on the paper's heading-W.C. and B.C.,—which obviously combines his initials with those of his brother Benjamin. The first-person phrasing of the postscript quoted further shows that Hooton the printer must have been a

partner in the enterprise. It is, incidentally, noticeable that many of the great eighteenth-century booksellers produced interesting work at early stages in their careers in partnership with local printers, and later set up printing offices of their own. Hooton's unfortunate "declining" of the paper may possibly have been the fault of the promoter himself. William Collins's advertisement shows that he purveyed (as did Edward Easton also) the highly popular Craftsman, together with The London Gazette and Fog's Journal, all at 2s. per quarter; and the people of Salisbury, hardly inured (in spite of Samuel Farley's efforts) to the habit of a local newspaper, probably found the easily-obtained London papers adequate to their needs and so failed to "encourage" this new enterprise.

But The Salisbury Journal was not dead. Its promoter was a man tenacious of his original scheme, and within a few years a new issue of the paper appeared. Hatcher mentions a "first number" dated November 27th, 1736, and published on a Tuesday. Of this copy all traces have disappeared, but it is clear that the proprietorship was the same as that of the original Number LVIII. The oldest existing copy for the late 'thirties that can now be traced is one in a volume of odd Salisbury Journals in the Salisbury Public Library, endorsed "Number 51, Monday, January 15th, 1738-9" (1739 NS.). The hopeless unreliability of the old system of numbering makes examination of the evidence offered by these early issues of old provincial papers very difficult, and deductions arrived at by "counting back" are seldom sound. Obviously, in the case of The Salisbury Journal, re-numbering must have taken place, or there may have been gaps in the issue (owing to further temporary lack of "encouragement") between November, 1736, and January, 1739. It is not impossible that there may even have been an earlier re-issue between July, 1730, and November, 1736, of which, as of Hatcher's "first number" for the latter year, no trace remains.

'See Part III., Section 1, on Samuel Farley and Philip Bishop as printers and booksellers in Exeter.