Mr. URBAN, Feb. 20. HE Forest of Charnwood, co. T Leicester, is a large tract of land, about ten miles in length, and six in breadth; in form somewhat square, and a hard and barren soil, full of hills, woods, rocks of stone, torres, and dells of a kind of slate. It was thus described in 1795 by that elegant Botanist Dr. Pulteney, in his "Catalogue of rare Plants found in its neighbourhood," communicated to Mr. Nichols for his " History of Leicestershire:" "A great part of this large tract of land is almost as much in a state of nature as any part of England. Some parts of it are elevated into considerable hills, bearing some resemblance to the Peak of Derbyshire; particularly those known by the names of Beacon Hill, Bardon Hill, Ives Head, Cliff Hill, &c. From the two former of these the views in clear weather are very extensive; reaching not only over a large part of the neighbouring counties, but even to the mountains of Wales. In proceeding Northwards by a direct line from the Southern parts of the kingdom, these hills are, I believe, the first part of the chain, or ridge, which at length constitutes the Peak of Derbyshire, and which is continued thence to the most Northern part of the kingdom. The summits of many of these hills, particularly that of Beacon Hill, which is considered as the highest, consist of vast naked craggy rocks, the crags almost universally facing the West. They are composed of a very hard grey stone, very like the blue Elvan stone of Cornwall, but not so fissile. It is of an extremely close grit, gives fire with steel, whence quartz seems to predominate in its composition, and some parts of it are almost irresistible to the hammer. Others of these rocks are composed of an imperfect kind of granite, of which a much more complete sort abounds in the neighbourhood of Mountsorell, where it is used in buildings, in the pavement of the streets, and to mend the high roads." In 1808 an Act of Parliament received the Royal assent, for allotting and dividing this very valuable tract of land; and in a few fleeting years the face of the country will be wholly changed. Already, in some parts of the Forest, have the pleasing toils of agriculture called hundreds of acres into cultivation; and good roads are forming over the whole in every convenient direction. Indeed, so nearly have the Commissioners completed GENT. MAG. March, 1815. their labours, that the whole will be ready for cultivation this Spring. A spacious Chapel has also been erected (see Plate II. fig. 1.) under the auspicious patronage of the worthy Diocesan, who is to consecrate it next Summer; where the mild and benevolent principles of Christianity will be properly inculcated on the descendants of many who have been nearly brought up in a state of nature. There are, and will be, about 220 acres of land set out in the Forest, for the endowment of this and any other Chapel that may be deemed expedient. That already built is in Lord Stamford's Peculiar, in the parish of Newtown Linford. The appointment is in six of the Lords of the Forest; viz. Earls of Stamford and Moira, Edward-March Phillipps, esq. William Herrick, esq. the Rev. Thomas Bosvile, and Edward Dawson, esq. Yours, &c. Mr. URBAN, B. N. Sproxton, Jan. 18. THE two Stones a and b, wrought and formed for some particular use, of which a rough sketch is given, (see fig. 2.) were lately found at Garthorpe, co. Leic. upon a bed of gravel, six or seven feet below the surface. It is requested of your Correspondts to explain their use,-in what age, or whether commonly found, or scarce. For the present, let them be called an Hand-mill. The nether millstone, a, is not much unlike a platter, or large shallow dish, with a shelved-off edge; in some places chipped; in others, broke down. The bottom is not quite flat, but gently rises to the centre (like a fishplate), which is perforated, apparently for the purpose of a spindle. Weight, 31 pounds; diameter, 16 inches. The upper millstone, b, resembling. in shape the bottom part of a cone or sugar-loaf, is extremely perfect, and was found in its proper place upon the other, which it exactly tits. At the top, c, is an aperture or hopper, 5 inches in diameter, contracting as it descends, and may hold three pints. Greatest diameter, 12 inches; least,7; and perpendicular height, 6 inches: weight, 33 pounds. Near about the situation of d, is a square hole, which communicates with the bottom of the hopper, or that in the centre, where there is a bed cut, evidently for a frame Dr. DUCAREL. I. Protestant Persecution: containing the Case of the Rev. Mr. HERPORT, of Berne, for writing a Book about Oaths. frame of iron-work, which may have Extracts from the MSS. of the late perished; and, by the wearing down on that side by natural pressure, we may be somewhat countenanced in an opinion of the handle having been fixed there. The stone (not met with in this country) is of a dirty white coarse grit, and may be taken for a rough composition of beat sand and mortar; and though it has not the least resemblance to millstones now in use, yet appears not ill calculated for the grinding of Corn. Yours, &c. Mr. URBAN, W. MOUNSEY. Elmesthorpe, near Hinckley, Jan.14. S many of your Readers, and CorAs respondents to your valuable Magazine, may be gratified with a description of what is curious or antique from near to Bosworth Field (where the decisive battle was fought between King Richard the Third and Henry Earl of Richmond, Aug. 22, 1485), as they are now, from the distance of time since that period, become extremely rare; you herewith receive a drawing of an Halberd, or Pike, (fig. 3.) found recently in the roof of an old house at Stapleton, which is supposed to have been preserved by the antient family of Dawes of that place. It is upwards of 9 feet in length, the shaft of oak, banded on four sides with iron, and studded with brass nails between every band; the shaft is surmounted with two wings of iron cut into rude open work, which terminates from the knob above the wings to a square taper point of about 2 feet in length. It is shod with sharp iron, to be occasionally rested in the ground. Stapleton being situate adjoining Radmore Plain, the field of battle, I have not the least doubt, it has been preserved as a rare relick of that memorable period, as it bears evident marks of other times t. Yours, &c. RICHARD FOWKE. *Fig. 4 is a Gold Broche, or Buckle, found near Husbands Bosworth; and has been fully described by the late Mr.Tailby, in vol. LXX. p. 121. "An Essay on Truths of Importance to the Happiness of Mankind." 8vo. London, 1768. Translated from the German. "THE Rev. Anthony Herport, author of this book, of a Patrician family at Berne (where his relations are still of the Magistracy there), was a man of great learning, and of considerable property in the Canton of Berne. Vevay; but, becoming deaf about 40 He was for many years Minister at years ago, had a pension of about 607. the Magistrates of Berne; which being per annum assigned to him for life by unwilling to enjoy in idleness, he wrote this book; with which the Privy Council of Berne was so much offended, that they first seized the whole edition, consisting of 1000 copies, of this book, and caused it to be publicly burnt-18 copies only escaped; for the recovery of each of these, the said Privy Council offered 100 dollars, about 207. sterling. This book is translated from one of these 18 copies. The Author was prosecuted, and condemoed (without being heard) to lose his character, his pension, and his liberty; soon after which he died in confinement (in his own house assigned for his prison) at Berne, a Martyr to Truth, in the 73d year of his age, A. D. 1767.” "Doctors'-Commons, April 9, 1768, I received this information from Mr. Valtravers, F. R. S. and F. S. A. who presented me with the book. AND. COLTEE DUCAREL." II. Concerning a Book (supposed to be unique) No. 860 in the MS Library ut Lambeth, entitled," Exposition de la Doctrine Catholique de M.Bossuet," a copy of which was faithfully transcribed and sent to the Library of Leyden University, by Archbishop Secker's direction, in March, 1764, attested by Dr. Maty and myself. * See Mr. Pridden's Plan in Nichols's re-publication of Hutton's Battle of Bosworth Field, and also the letter-press in that historical and descriptive work. + Baker's Chronicle says, "The battle King Richard led himself, which consisted of a thousand bill-men, empaled with two thousand pikes," &c. &c. "L'exem 1 "L'exemplaire du Livre de l'Exposition de la Doctrine Catholique de l'Eveque Bossuet, qui se trouve dans 1a Bibliotheque des Manuscripts de l'Archeveque de Canterbury, y fut déposé il y a plusieurs années, par Mr. Le Docteur Wake, successivement Recteur de la Paroisse de S. Jacques, à Westminster, Eveque de Lincoln, et enfin Archeveque de Canterbury, depuis l'année 1715 jusqu'à l'année 1786. C'est un petit volume in 120. La plus grande partie du texte est imprimée, savoir depuis la page jusqu'à la page 72, et depuis la page 97 jusqu'à la page 144. Les pages intermédiaires sont manuscriptes, savoir depuis la page 73 jusqu'à la page 96, et depuis la page 145 jusqu'à la page 174, qui est la dernière. Le titre du livre, les approbations et privileges, et la table des chapitres à la fin, sont aussi en manuscript. Les at testations préliminaires ont été écrites de la propre main de Messieurs Wake et Allix; et à la marge de plusieurs des pages du livre se trouvent des notes, la plupart consistant en collations de cette édition primitive avec les exemplaires des éditions postérieures. Elles ont été copiées au revers de chaque page de cette copie, vis-à-vis les endroits où elles se rapportent, avec les renvois, et marques, qui se trouveut dans l'original. Nous soussignez certifions qu'ayant examiné avec soin et duement collationné la copie ci dessus de ce livre avec l'Exemplaire original de la Bibliotheque Archiepiscopale des Manuscripts de Lambeth, nous l'avons trouvée conforme en tout avec cet Exemplaire, et pour en constater et en assurer la parfaite authenticité, nous avons non seulement signé le présent certificat, mais avons outre cela souscript à chaque page les lettres initiales de nos noms. Fait à Londres le 27 de Fevrier, A. D. 1764. AND. COLTEE Ducarel, III. liging letter, were left last Tuesday at my house. I beg leave, first of all, to thank you for this particular mark of friendship to me: I have perused the book with great pleasure. As the Archbishop was very ill of the gout, I had no opportunity of acquainting him with the contents of your letter till yesterday, when I received hisLordship's commands; which are these to return you his thanks for your kind present of that book to the Lambeth Library, which is made in such an handsome manner that it could not be refused (although the Archbishop had lately got one for his own private Library); to enter your name therein as the donor; and to inform you that the Translation shews a great deal of learning, modesty, and candour in the Translator, who has rectified many mistakes, and whose principal design seems to be that of doing service to mankind. A. C. D. Mr. URBAN, As t Old Town, Stratfordupon-Avon, Feb. 13. S the intercourse with France is once more renewed, and as several of our Countrymen who have lately visited that Kingdom have favoured us, through the medium of periodical publications, with their notices of a part of the Continent from which a protracted war had completely excluded us; it may af ford entertainment to your Readers to peruse a Journal of a short excursion, in the year 1742, to some of the maritime towns of France, opposite the Kentish coast, written by Henry Bartlett, a native of Stratford-uponAvon, where he was baptized upon the 12th of October, 1718; and communicated, a short time before his death, to his brother-in-law, the Rev. Joseph Greene, late of this place. This intelligent young man, who was the son of Mr. Richard Bartlett, an eminent surgeon and apothecary here, by Cecilia his wife, established himself in London in the same profession as his father followed; but died in or soon after 1744, about 26 years of age. If his descriptions be censured as tediously minute, and his observations dull and unimportant, let it be remembered that they are the remarks of one just entering into life, to whom, perhaps, every thing appeared new and interesting; of one who wrote wrote with confidence to a friend and relation, without the expectation that his Journal would have filled a few pages of your popular Repository. The following is copied from Greene's transcript, now in the possession of, Yours, &c. R. B. WHELER. 1 ON Tuesday morning, June the 29th [1742], at 7 o'clock, I, with my Companion, took a boat at Falcon-stairs, Southwark, the Thames being then at pretty near high water. We went through London-bridge with some difficulty; but continued not long upon the river, chusing to land at Cox's wharf, that we might, for the sake of variety, more commodiously walk from thence to Greenwich. Here a small shower obliged us to take immediate shelter. After dinner 'at this pleasant village, we took boat again for our conveyance towards the Magazine and Foundry at Woolwich; where, through the ignorance of our waterman, we landed with a great deal of difficulty, being almost up to our knees in the boggy soil. Indeed the roughness of the Thames at this place strongly influenced us to quit our boat so soon; and yet I think, if there had been a knowingone amongst us, we might have picked out a firmer soil for our landing-place than this part of Greenwich Marsh. Except our seeing two porpusses, or hog-fish, nothing further worthy of notice happened till our arrival at Woolwich, which village we entered about four in the afternoon, somewhat fatigued with our walk. Here we saw the St. Joseph prize, a capture that the Spaniards would be glad to have again, if we would surrender it peaceably. We had a view also of the King's rope-yard for the use of the Navy Royal. At ten in the evening we went on board a sloop at Green-dragon stairs, near Woolwich, Capt. Gilpin commander, burthen forty tons, without any carriage or swivel guns; but, that it might not be said to be wholly without arms, we had, for annoyance of our enemies, one old rusty gun in the cabin. Our whole complement of men were as follows: first, the Captain and his crew, which were only his cook and cabin-boy; and secondly, eight passengers, one of which was an old drunken Captain, who was going to St. Valerois. As we passed by Gravesend, we heard the report of three great guns, which surprized me very much; but we met with nothing further remarkable betwixt that place and Sheerness, near the mouth of the river Medway, except you reckon the floating light on the North-sand as such; a contrivance to direct ships in the time of darkness, placed there at the expence of David Avery, a merchant of London, June the 15th, 1731. By this time I began to be exceedingly sick. A squall of wind ran our gunnel under water, and in about an hour drove us upon the Flats, some shoals of sand near the mouth of the Thames, called the Spaniard;which, for want of the tide to lift us off, obliged us to cast anchor. Here we had two or three smart showers of rain, which not washing away our appetite, we began to think on the contents of our cupboard, namely, a leg of mutton, an half-quartern loaf, &c. which provision we had taken in at Woolwich to serve us in our passage to Dover or Calais, according as the wind should prove favourable. To lose no time, we here boiled our leg of mutton; and five of our number, whose stomachs were most importunate, sate down to eat heartily, with only one trencher among them. I, to my great grief, was no companion for these, though I could observe them from my bed in my cabin, where I lay thoroughly sick, and much dispirited. However, after a little rest, I endeavoured, as I lay, to eat a little; and could scarcely forbear smiling, when I considered the rather indelicate mode of taking my repast, with my bread in one hand, and meat in the other, gnawing it like a dog, without trencher, knife, or salt. The tide coming in, we weighed anchor, and spoke with several homewardbound ships from Portugal, Antigua, and Jamaica, which met us in the North Foreland; and though we were in some little danger, by reason of the lightness of our sloop, yet by six o'clock in the evening we had proceeded so far on our voyage as to double the North Foreland, which is the North-East point or cape of Kent, and put in safely at Bradstow, or Broadstairs, a kind of small port on the East side of the Isle of Thanet. Our stoppage here was chiefly occasioned by the wind's now becoming much too boisterous for our little vessel to live out at sea; wherefore, to pass our time more agreeably, we went a little mile up the country, to a small town called St. Peter's, where a fair was then kept, and lay there that night, returning to Bradstow early next morning. The inhabitants of Bradstow are chiefly fishermen, civil and obliging people. It was at the latter end of the mackarel season when we came here; however, we bought six very large ones for a shilling, just after they were taken out of the sea, which relished deliciously. I walked |