ame first in is uncertain, only we
are certain it was a denomination in use in the time of H. III.
or Ed. I. and after ages. But it was not in use at the time of
the compiling of {412} Doomsday, for if it were we should have
found it there where there is so great occasion of mention of
Firmes, Rents, and Payments. Hovended in _Rich. I fol. 377. b._
Nummus _a_ Numa, _que fuit le primer Roy que fesoit moneies en_
Rome. _Issint Sterlings, alias Esterlings, queux primes fesoient
le money de cest Standard en_ Engleterre."--_Sheriffs'
Accompts_, p. 5-9.

So much for the derivation of _Sterling_, which evidently applied
originally to the metal rather than to a coin. May I be allowed to
hazard a suggestion as to the origin of _peny_, its synonym? They were
each equivalent to the Denarius.

"_Denarius Angliae, qui nominatur Sterlingus, rotundus sine
tonsura, ponderabit 32 grana in medio spicae. Sterlingus et
Denarius sont tout un. Le Shilling consistoit de 12 sterlings.
Le substance de cest denier ou sterling peny al primes fuit
vicessima pars unicae._"--_Indentures of the Mint_, Ed. I and VI.

May we not derive it from Denarius by means of either a typographical or
clerical error in the initial letter. This would at once give a new
name--the very thing they were in want of--and we may very easily
understand its being shortened into Penny.

G.
Milford, April 15.

* * * * *

HANNO'S PERIPLUS.

"Mr. Hampson" has served the cause of truth in defending Hanno and the
Carthaginians from the charge of cruelty, brought against them by Mr.
Attorney-General Bannister. A very slender investigation of the bearings
of the narration would have prevented it. I know not how Dr. Falconer
deals with it, not having his little volume at hand; but in so common a
book as the _History of Maritime Discovery_, which forms part of
Lardner's _Cabinet Cyclopaedia_, it is stated that these _Gorillae_ were
probably some species of _ourang-outang_. Purchas says they might be the
_baboons_ or _Pongos_ of those parts.

The amusing, and always interesting, Italian, Hakluyt, in the middle of
the sixteenth century, gives a very good version of the [Greek: ANNONOS
PERIPLOUS], with a preliminary discourse, which would also have
undeceived Mr. Bannister, had he been acquainted with it, and prevented
Mr. Hampson's pleasant exposure of his error.

Ramusio says, "Seeing t