7 JUNE 1919, Page 3

Mr. Balfour's estate at Whittingehame has become as famous as

Boscoreale or Hildeeheim through the discovery, on the hill- top of Traprain Law, of a wonderful store of Roman silver. Mr. Curie and Mr. George Macdonald, the two well-known Scottish archaeologists, were excavating an old hill fort when they came upon this hoard, which, according to Professor Haverfield in Wednesday's Times, filled three buckets. The silver is apparently church plate looted from an early monastery on the Continent and buried at Whittingehame, perhaps in the fourth century, by some Teutonic pirate. The plate is much damaged, but is "exquisite in technique" and partly Christian in design. One inscription perhaps refers to the German monas- tery of Prilm. No such find has ever before been made in Britain. Professor Haverfield states that the silver will be preserved in one of the Edinburgh museums. It is one more triumph for the spade under skilled direction.