392 Squirrel Seal.-Mortimer Pedigree.-Church Benefices. [May, ings of any one, he readily acknow. ledges his regret; the rivalry between the various benevolent institutions and their promoters should be, in his opinion, a generous and friendly one; and if any real good be done, he will truly rejoice in it, through whatever honest medium it may be accomplished. Yours, &c. A. Mr. URBAN, May 3. THE interpretation which Mr. Madden has given of the inscription on the Evesham seal is equally ingenious and satisfactory; but I doubt whether he has been equally fortunate in his restoration of the inscription on the seal engraved in the Gentleman's Magazine for December 1825. I have four charters, to each of which is appended a seal bearing a device similar to that on the one which is engraved, a squirrel in the act of cracking a nut; and the inscription round the figure is not I CRAVE NOTIS, but, too plainly to be mistaken, I CRAKE NOTIS. The impressions are of different types, though the figure and the inscription are in all the same. They are. also appended to charters all executed at the same place, Wolvelay, now Wolley, a village a few miles south of Wakefield. The earliest was dated at Pentecost, 1304: the others in 1352, 1358, and 1378. Each deed was from a different party. Mr. URBAN, JOSEPH HUNTER. Bath, May 1. Tafair of so much importance to HE accuracy of pedigrees is an families, that I am induced to notice a promise made by Mr. Blore, the histo rian of Rutlandshire, in p. 230 of that work, to give an account of the evidences and reasons of his rejecting the authority of Dugdale, in the Monasticon, vol. ii. p. 222, O. E. as to that part of the pedigree of Mortimer which relates to the descent of Hugh son of Roger de Mortimer, Baron of Wigmore, who died in 1215 (17 John), which Hugh is by Mr. Blore considered as the son of Roger by his second wife, and Ralph (who, according to the Monasticon, succeeded to the Barony on the decease of this Hugh, his half brother) to have been the son by the former wife: so, that if Mr. Blore be correct, and Dugdale in an error, Hugh de Mortimer dying in 1227 was not Baron of Wigmore. Perceiving, however, that the learned and attentive editors of the new edition of the Monasticon have not adopted the emendation of the Historian of Rutlandshire, but continue the former account in their 6th vol. p. 351, as in the old edition, and that the promised evidences, which were to be given under Okeham, do not, so far as I have seen, appear, it will be a great favour, if any genealogical correspondent will afford the benefit of such information as may elucidate this subject through the channel of your Magazine, tọ OBSERVER. A GREAT deal is said, and justly, at this time, respecting the disproportion of emoluments in theChurch establishment. May I be permitted to suggest one plain and simple mode of improvement, to which no reasonable objection can be urged. By 5th Queen Aune, c. 24, the bishops of every diocese are required to inform themselves, by the oaths of witnesses,of the clear improved yearly value of every benefice with cure of souls within their respective jurisdictions, which does not exceed 50l. per ann., and to certify the same into the Exchequer, in order that such benefices may be discharged from the payment of the first fruits and tenths, and that all above that value should, by their first fruits and tenths, contribute to the augmentation of the former. The Governors of the Royal Bounty_have proceeded in the regular course of augmentation since the year 1714, on the valuation of all ecclesiastical preferment then made, but it is computed that 300 years will elapse before all the livings already certified as under 501. per annum, will, under the present system, be augmented to that sum. If the present improved value of all ecclesiastical property, to which no cure of souls is annexed, should be ascertained (which would be easily effected), and their first fruits and tenths applied to the augmentation of small benefices, in the course of twenty years, or less, each benefice would be rendered sufficient for the residence of a beneficed clergyman. Nothing can be more equitable' than that every ecclesiastical preferment which has not the cure of souls, should contribute the actual value of its first fruits and tenths to the augmentation of benefices which have the cure of souls. T. R. B. 1830.] MR. URBAN, Lambeth Palace. May 8. I SEND you a view of Lambeth Palace, sketched from the north side, immediately after the removal of the materials belonging to those parts of the edifice which, in the month of July 1829, it was found necessary, on account of their decayed and worn-out condition, to take down, and nearly on the site of which the new buildings are now rapidly proceeding, under the skilful superintendance of Mr. Blore to completion. To your numerous antiquarian readers there will be unmixed satisfaction in being assured that throughout the extensive reparations of this ancient 1. Left in ruins after the death of Archbishop Langton, who died in 1228. 2. Suffered in the wars of the Roses from 1422 to 1464. 3. Suffered spoliation in the Civil Wars from 1646 to 1660. The library, in 1646, was saved by its removal at the suggestion of the learned Selden to Cambridge. But Chichely's hall was pulled down, and the materials sold by Scot the regicide, for his private use. 893 structure (comprehending some of the most venerable architectural remains connected with our church history) there has been, as might well be expected, a studious care on the part of the Archbishop of Canterbury to pre serve all the leading marks by which the eye of the biographer, the historian, and the philosopher, have recognised it from age to age. My sketch may perhaps be rendered more intelligible, if I premise my description of it by a few chronological memoranda. This Palace was three times destroyed and as often rebuilt, with various intervening additions and improvements, by successive Archbishops. Rebuilt by Archbishop Boniface, elected 1244. Rebuilt by Archbishop Rebuilt by Abp.Juxon, after the restoration in 1660. Subsequently to which, the library, at the demand of Abp. Juxon and his successor Sheldon, was returned from Cambridge: replaced by Abp. Sheldon, and augmented by him and successive Archbishops. The foregoing particulars may suffice to show that the several objects introduced into the sketch most remarkable for their antiquity, and for the historical associations they excite, have been studiously preserved through out the recent improvements at the Palace, as far as the ravages of time permitted. The foreground of the view is now occupied by the north side of the new Palace. The wall with the two chimnies to the left (see the Plate) marks the site of the buildings then partly, and since entirely taken down. The necessity for this measure, through the decayed condition of the walls, was inevitable. The roof, however, from its peculiar character and antiquity, and from the extraordinary soundness of the timbers, has been carefully retained; and the walls are now rebuilding, to form the principal dining-room, in a GENT. MAG. May, 1830. Additions of a magnificent hall and of the Lollards' tower made by Abp. Chichely, elected 1414. Guardchamber existing as early as 1424. Addition of the library founded by Archbishop Bancroft, who at his death, 1610, bequeathed all his books to his successors in the See for ever. Archbishop Abbot, who succeeded, added also his books. style correspondent with the remainder of the new Palace. A further most judicious adaptation consists in converting another handsome portion of this ancient building into a proper receptacle for the various literary treasures with which it has been long known to abound. You will observe, that in the view are represented the lanthorn and vane belonging to the great hall called Juxon's Hall. They appear above the roof of the Guard-chamber which intercepts the remainder of this elegant building. This Hall, eminent for its grandeur and beautiful proportions, has been converted with singular skill and felicity into the archiepiscopal library; and the former library, which was in the interior in the old Palace, and very much decayed by time, has been removed. Contiguous to the hall (or new library) over a newly-built internal gate into an area, whence turning to the right you proceed under the new internal gateway above described, into a spacious court-yard, having Juxon's hall (now the library) and the dining room (late the guard chamber) on the west side; the new buildings on the north side; an ornamented wall with gateways to the out-offices on the east side; and the Church, in part, on the south side. The Church tower is seen in the view; a building in the distance to the left. On the north side the drawing exhibits towards the spectator's right hand other ancient towers; that to the westward (partly concealed by an elm) being the famed Lollard's tower. "I lament," says Pennant, "to find so worthy a man (Abp. Chichely) to have been the founder of a building so reproachful to his memory as the Lollard's tower, at the expense of near 280 pounds. Neither Protestants nor Catholics should omit visiting this tower, the cruel prison of the unhappy followers of Wickliffe. The vast staples and rings to which they were chained before they were brought to the stake ought to make Protestants bless the hour which freed them from so bloody a period. Catholics may glory that time has softened their zeal into charity for all sects, and made them blush at these memorials of the misguided zeal of our ancestors." (Pennant's London, 4to. 1793, p. 20.) Between the Lollard's tower and that eastward of it, is the north side of the ancient chapel, of which the east end is remarkable for five narrow windows seen in the centre of the view. You will observe, therefore, that the new Palace is erecting chiefly on the site of the old, extending eastward from the lofty tower that adjoins the chapel. The plan appears to me to be in the best taste, partaking chiefly of a Gothic character, and well worthy of its designer, Mr. Blore, one of our ablest restorers of Gothic art. All the new work will be of stone. The principal doorway will be up a flight of steps between two high towers in the centre of the north side of the new court yard above described. The buildings which occupied this latter site consisted of the dining room and gallery, extending along the whole of the old north front, together with a study and chambers in the rear of them, but having no rooms over them). Other buildings removed from the spot adjoining to that where the wall and two chimnies (since taken away) are shown in the sketch. At the southeast corner of the guard-room were the drawing-room and anti-room, the kitchen, and other offices; the scite of all which now forms a part of the court-yard. A new kitchen and offices will be commodiously erected westward of the state dining-room. Where so much required renovation, it is surprising that so little has been changed. Those venerable remains, the grand gateway and towers near the Church; the hall, called 1 |