AMONG fourteenth-century ivory carvings, there are a number of pieces whose form and construction have puzzled scholars for many decades. There are objects that appear to be mirror covers, but which, unusually, are flat on the back; there are covers for sets of wax tablets with a depression in the centre of the back or a slightly raised circle without a known use; and there are reversible plaques carved on both sides without signs of hinging or mounting. Most intriguing among those objects which have defied identification is a small group of ivory boxes in which the interior of each box is partitioned with unusual forms. On the left of each is a long slot extending the full length of the box, and to the right of this is a flower-shaped central division with either areas of empty space on each side or with the remaining area divided into small square or rectangular depressions. (Figs.2-9.)

IT has generally been thought that Edward III and Philippa of Hainault had little interest in illuminated manuscripts or, for that matter, the arts in general. The manuscripts associated with their patronage have some-times been labelled as 'undistinguished'. However, a number of documents and a small corpus of books can be associated with both Philippa and Edward, indicating that they were interested in reading books and may have valued illuminated manuscripts, even if their interest was never as great as that of their French counterparts. Two illuminated Psalters which bear the arms of England and Hainault have survived, and it seems certain that they belonged to Philippa. A third Psalter has long been associated with a prince of the English Royal family (Oxford Bodleian Library Ms. Douce 131), and it has recently been suggested that this may well be Edward III himself. In addition to these liturgical books, Edward was presented by one of his tutors, Walter of Milemete, with a treatise on good government, a companion volume to the Pseudo-Aristotelian text De Secretis Secretorum presented to him in 1326-27; both these manuscripts were richly illuminated by some of the finest illuminators in England at that time. The purpose of this article is first to show that the early fourteenth-century compilation of texts which is contained in Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale Ms. Fr. 571 should be added to this list, since heraldic evidence proves that it was made for presentation by Philippa to Edward late in 1326, and second that the Statutes of England manuscript at Harvard (Law School Library Ms. 12) once formed part of the same manuscript compilation (Figs.12 and 13).

In the years 1713-15, the leading Venetian painter of the day, Sebastiano Ricci, painted a series of large canvases entirely covering the upper walls and ceiling of a newly constructed grand staircase in Burlington House in Piccadilly. The subjects chosen were mythologies: in the ceiling an Olympus (Fig.45), with Cupid as the central figure, addressing Jupiter and Juno: on the walls three canvases of uncertain iconography, which may for convenience be called The Triumph of Diana (Fig.47), The Triumph of Bacchus (Fig.46) and The Triumph of Galatea (Fig.48). All these survive, though the staircase has been removed. The Olympus remains in its original position, as the ceiling of what is now the Council Room, the Diana and the Galatea grace the upper part of the present main staircase, and the Bacchus has become the ceiling of the Assembly Room.

WHENI started to work at the Leger Gallery, Old Bond Street, there were no other women, let alone a young girl, prominent in the Old Master galleries. Those employed were simply secretaries. Later, having risen above that status, I got to know most of the London and Paris dealers and because of my unique position they treated me with an amused courtesy and went out of their way to be both helpful and instructive. After one successful deal that Mr Leger made in conjunction with an antique dealer, and in which I had played a small part, the latter rewarded me with the gift of a hat of my choice, not having liked to offer me a monetary commission. On another occasion Mr Leger presented me with a pair of long evening gloves - an acceptable and uncompromising gift from a man to a woman. As I gradually became more experienced in Old Masters and had begun to establish regular contemporary exhibitions, I received, besides the salary I was earning of two pounds ten shillings a week, an additional small com-mission on sales. But we were in the middle of the deep recession of the early thirties and sales were pathetically few. The situation was so bad that I feel several galleries would have gone bankrupt had there not been a slow improvement in the middle of the decade.

IT is, perhaps, too infrequently noted that Poussin was not always willing to accept commissions for religious subjects. When Jacques Stella, who once owned Poussin's painting of the Crucifixion, asked him to paint Christ carrying the Cross as a pendant to it, Poussin responded.

IN a description published in 1674 of a visit to the house of the Marquis of Voghera (a member of the dal Pozzo family) in Turin, Luigi Pellegrino Scaramuccia spoke highly of two paintings by Poussin and two by Pietro da Cortona, all four of the same format ('di honesta grandezza') and representing biblical subjects. Since the paintings by Poussin have been identified as the Adoration of the golden calf (Fig.66; now National Gallery, London) and the Crossing of the Red Sea (Fig.65; now National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne), it has been plausibly suggested that the two lost Cortona paintings must also have depicted scenes from the life of Moses. Jacob Bean and Anthony Blunt tentatively connected a Cortona drawing in the Louvre of the Finding of Moses with the dal Pozzo series; the drawing, however, is vertical in format, while the Poussins are horizontal.

A private collection in Paris has recently acquired a study (Fig.67) for Les Pestiférés de Jaffa of 1804 by Baron Gros (Fig.72). It measures 18 by 29 cm and is drawn on white laid paper with an illegible watermark, using a quill and black iron-gall ink. This has generally turned brown and in certain heavily emphasised areas (notably Bonaparte's hat) has begun to eat through the paper. The provenance is unclear before May 1980, when the drawing was discovered in an antique shop in Nantes and acquired by the present owner. Tripier Le Franc's catalogue of 1880 makes no mention of it but does refer to a number of general lots of drawings in which it could easily have been included. Attribution must therefore rest entirely on stylistic resting on 'Egyptian' capitals, the Moorish arch to the right, the zigzag crenellation, the omission of the astonished Arab to the far right, and the costume of the stretcher bearers. More important, the face of the blind soldier reaching towards Bonaparte has been turned towards the spectator, as has that of the young surgeon Saint-Ours in the bottom right-hand corner, who dies with the body of another victim in his arms.