We have received a copy of Dr. Rimbault’s Musical Illustrations of Bishop Percy’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry:  a Collection of Old Ballad Tunes, chiefly from rare MSS. and Early printed Books, deciphered from the obsolete Notation, and harmonized and arranged according to Modern Usage.  If any thing could add to the extensive popularity which Percy’s work has continued to enjoy ever since its first appearance, (for have we not Washbourne’s handsome reprint of it, published within this year or two?) it must be the quaint and racy melodies, the “old antique strains,” to which these fine old ballads were anciently sung.  Dr. Rimbault, who combines great musical acquirements with a rich store of antiquarian knowledge, in giving us these, has produced a work as carefully executed as it is original in its character; one which can only be exceeded in interest by the Musical Illustrations of Shakspeare’s Plays, which we are glad to see promised from the same competent authority.

We are at length enabled to announce that The Treatise on Equivocation, so often referred to in our columns, is about to be published under the editorship of Mr. Jardine, whose attention has long been directed to it from its connexion with the Gunpowder Conspiracy; and whose intimate acquaintance with that subject, as shown in his Criminal Trials, is a sufficient pledge for his ability to do justice to this curious and important historical document.

We regret to learn, from the Catalogue of the Museum of Mediaeval Art, collected by the late Mr. Cottingham, which has been very carefully drawn up, with a preface by Mr. Shaw, that, if the Family are disappointed in disposing of the Museum to the Government, or by private contract, it will be submitted to Public Sale in April next, and a Collection of the most ample and varied examples of Mediaeval Architecture ever brought together, which has been formed at a vast outlay both of labour and cost, will be dispersed, and be thereby rendered inaccessible and valueless to the architectural student.

The Rev. W.H.  Kelke has published some Notices of Sepulchral Monuments in English Churches, a work which is not intended for professed antiquaries, but for that large class of persons who, although they have some taste for the subject of which it treats, have neither time nor inclination to enter deeply into it, and as will, we have no doubt, be very acceptable to those to whom it is immediately addressed.

We regret to announce the death of one of our earliest and most valued contributors, Professor T.S.  Davies of Woolwich.  “Probably few men in England,” says the Athenaeum, “were better versed in the methods of the old geometers, or possessed a more critical appreciation of their relative merits.”  His death is a great loss to geometrical science, as well as to a large circle of friends.

We have received the following Catalogues:—­Stacey and Co. (19.  Southampton Street, Strand) Catalogue of Books chiefly relating to History, Commerce, and Legislation; G. Bumstead’s (205.  High Holborn) Catalogue of Interesting and Rare Books on the Occult Sciences, America, Asia, &c.