SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK.
Intim in this column does not necessarily preclude subsequent review.) • The Public Records of Scotland. By J. Maitland Thomson. (Glasgow : Maelehose, Jackson. 10s. 6d. net.)—Dr. Maitland Thomson has printed his Rhind Lectures of 1911, the fruit of a long official career in the General Register House at Edinburgh. They give a comprehensive and interesting account of the Scottish records. As is well known, Scotland has preserved very few of her early records, and for that reason large tracts of Scottish mediaeval history remain obscure. The Edinburgh archives suffered in repeated invasions from the time of Edward I. to that of Cromwell. When the State papers were returned to Scotland at the Restoration, the ship carrying them was wrecked and eighty-five hogsheads of documents were lost. What survived from the wreck was sorely neglected for generations, until in the days Of Scott a safe home was provided for the records and a capable antiquary, Thomas Thomson, was found to care for them. Yet, though the early records are scanty, the later records, from the Reformation onwards, are abundant. English readers will be interested in Dr. Maitland Thomson's chapter on the " The Notary Public " and the land register—strictly speaking, a register of con- veyances and not of titles—which has been successfully main- tained in Scotland for centuries, and also in his account of the register of deeds, which contains an astonishing mass of miscellaneous information bearing on local and family affairs, from the Restoration -onwards. Students of Scottish history will find Dr. Maitland Thomson's book invaluable.
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