thrifty, that it may well stand a century longer. The oldest inhabitant in the parish cannot remember that it ever made a better appearance than it does now. It cannot have been sown or planted the day of Sir Philip's birth, as has been said; but must have been a favourite tree of his, to recline under its shade, and enjoy his reveries; for I cannot allow it a year less than 350. There is also a venerable Pear-tree near Houghton Park (of which Mr. Pennant has given so good a drawing in his last work), called Sir Philip Sidney's. I was a week at Penshurst; rummaged the Parish Register; and saw and heard as much of that fine old place as most people, except, perhaps, Mr. Thorpe, who, I learned, had made some long visits in the parish; but who quitted it at midnight, while I was there, on account of the quarrel of two lovers on the brink of matrimony. "While I was at Margate, I went a pilgrimage to the Church of Reculver, which, though a venerable pile of building, I found, like other objects, more striking at a distance, than upon a near examination. It never was an elaborate piece of work; and, from its exposed situation, has suffered much. Some of the original floor remains. It was a coarse and very strong terras, with a thin incrustation of a smooth red; it must have looked well; and I remember not the like in an old religious building. Here rest the bones of the restless Raphe Brooke, esq. with a poetical epitaph, with his portrait over it, excessively neatly scratched (for it is little more) on black marble *. It is exactly like that prefixed to his Discovery,' &c. The monument is mural, on the South side of the chancel. Some of it is fallen down, and broken; and the rest will follow in due time. You, doubtless, have his epitaph; or else it should be at your service t. After wet or frost, some parts of the adjoining cliff crumble, and fall on the shore, where the children constantly pick up old coins, that fall at the same time. I might have bought a handful of them; but they were so excessively corroded, that I did not think them worth bringing off. "At Ramsgate I picked up two neat aquatinta engravings, just then published; one of The Bathing Place, Ramsgate," the other, The Harbour and Pier, Ramsgate," drawn by R. Green, 1781, engraved by V. Green and F. Jukes. The chalky cliffs are ill represented, as confused and irregular blocks; instead of regular horizontal strata about three feet deep each, with a thin layer of flints between most of them. This might easily have been represented, and would have had a good effect. "Kendall has just published his Fornham Encampment.' "We have a flying report here, that Lort is going to marry the widow of our old friend. That he has left the Archbishop is, I suppose, certain; and that he has bought a house in Saville-row is equally so. I shall always be glad to hear from you; and, as to answering, in me Mora non erit ulla. J. CULLUM." * See this engraved in the "History of Reculver and Herne," Bibl. Top. Brit. No XVIII. p. 73. + Some Notes taken at Reculver, Sept. 9, 1782, by Sir John Cullum, are printed in the above Number of the Bibl. Top. Brit. p. 88. "DEAR "DEAR SIR, Hardwick House, Jan. 14, 1783. "I should have acknowledged the favour of your last before this, but that my house has resounded with two young noisy nephews for the last three weeks, during which time I was half boy and half schoolmaster; and utterly incapable of doing any thing else but attending to them. "I congratulate you upon the purchase of the Cambridge MSS.; and am sorry to find that those of Cole are doomed to so long a state of darkness *. What a strange Will did he make! it could by no means be called 'the last act of a wise man.' His description of Browne Willis's dress, in Bowyer's Life,' falls short of his own, the only time I had ever the pleasure of seeing him, when he had as many envelopes about him as an onion. It was a very warm autumnal day, when he and three more came in a coach and four from Cambridge to dine at Barrow Parsonage, to which I had the honour of being invited. As soon as he was unpacked, he threw off a rug surtout, and entered the parlour, invested with waistcoat, coat, great coat, master of arts' gown, and hussar cloak; the inferior parts defended with boot-stockings and galoches. Thus accoutered, he sat down to dinner; and George and I have often laughed at all his rollings about, and the various distortions into which he was forced to throw himself, to disengage his arms sufficiently to get his victuals and drink to his mouth. With all his incumbrances, however, he was in perfect good humour, and most cheerful company. I hope the steeple † will sit lightly upon him. "The Houghton Pear-tree was not gone in Autumn 1781. The landlord of the principal inn at Ampthill pointed it out to me as a curiosity, when he attended me in the little circuit of that house, and the neighbouring one of Lord Ossory's. "How do you like Mr. Warton's Specimen of a History of Oxfordshire?" It is certainly better than what an ordinary hand could produce; yet not equal to what might have been expected from such a master. A Parochial History seems to me no very easy task; particularly in the arrangement of the materials. Mr. Warton begins with the History of the Church; the Author of the well-written Account of Hinckley, with that of Property. "I wish you would give me your opinion about this matter. The Queries relative to this subject that have been dispersed for several years, at different periods, particularly the last set, do indeed direct to the proper objects of enquiry, but do not lay down a plan for the best disposition and ordering of the several parts. My neighbour George, with whom I have talked upon this subject, says, Surely Natural History should have the precedence, as being the work of God.' But I apply to you as an oracle in this business; for I am meditating an Historiola of my native Parish of Hawsted, where chance has given me some interest, and for which I have no small stock of materials; and, *They were directed to remain close in the Museum for twenty years; and were not laid open to the public eye till 1802. See vol. I. p. 674. He was buried under the belfry of St. Clement's church, Cambridge. if you wish to give me any encouragement, send me your advice and direction as above requested; as also the Domesday account of it, which, I suppose, you have in your Library. You mention in your Topography' that melons, and other luxuries of the kitchen-garden, were cultivated in the reign of Edward III. and afterwards neglected on account of the Wars of the Houses of York and Lancaster; and quote Holinshed and Barrington as authorities. I suppose the first edition of the former, which I have not; of the latter, mine is the fourth edition. I wish you could refer me to the year under which Holinshed treats that business; and where I could find the passage in Barrington. "It might, perhaps, be prudence in you to say you know nothing of what I enquire; for, if you satisfy me, you may be pestered with further questions, and the progress of your noble works interrupted by such petty affairs as mine. J. C." Hardwick House, March 1, 1783. "I beg you will accept my best thanks for your last kind communication; an acknowledgment you should have received sooner, but that I knew, whenever I sent it, it would be attended with further requests and importunities. "DEAR SIR, "Was Odo, who held a carucate in Hawsted in Domesday Book, the warlike Bishop of Baieux? The reason I ask is, that in Monasticon Anglicanum, vol. I. p. 294, Odo & ... ..sua dederunt Hawsted.' The blank, I suppose, is to be filled up with 'uxor.' And was that Bishop married? 28 freemen had four car'; Odo one; and two Ecclesiastics two.-What is haras, a corn sown in the time of Richard II. ?-what kind of servant was a deye? he was of an inferior degree.-1 auc' 4 auc' marol. a gander and four geese, doubtless; but what is marol?-In an account of the funeral expences of a lady of some consequence, 9 Edw. I. is this item, 'Pro sindone & serico & aliis necessariis emptis pro corpore domine acciliando'. What is the meaning of the last word? I cannot well mistake it; for it is as well written as any other word; but it is very difficult to distinguish a c from a t. "You see how busy I am about my History. It will take me up much more time than I expected. I hardly knew the quantity and value of my materials till now that I have examined them minutely. We are born with eyes, Gray used to say; but it is often a long time before we use them. As long a chapter as any will be about the value and cultivation of land, with other incidental circumstances connected with them, as collected from bailiff's accounts, leases, &c. This is a walk untrodden, I think, by my Brother Topographers. I wish my example may stimulate some of my Compatriots to similar attempts. But I am well aware, that the men of fortune, who have the best materials in their possession, will continue indifferent about the matter. The Clergy have not the materials, and, in general, can tell nothing of their Parishes higher than their Registers go. Yet, if they would tell us all they do or might know, their information would be valuable. A History of only Local Customs, Manners, and Peculiarities, would be entertaining.—I am glad to find that Mr. VOL. VIII. Nichols Y Y Nichols has so many Parochial Histories in petto. In the account of Luton, though I know the Penetralia of the house are inaccessible to common mortals, yet such objects as are without-doors might have been noted. Of this sort, is a statue of the late Princess Dowager of Wales, surmounted on a pillar, on the base of which is, Dum memor ipse mei, dum spiritus hos reget artus. "I am very truly yours, JOHN CULLUM." "DEAR SIR, Hardwick House, March 4, 1783. "You mention, in Norfolk, that Churchyard's Account of Queen Elizabeth's Progress through Norfolk and Suffolk is in Mr. Claxton's possession. I should be obliged to you to procure from that gentleman what is said of her coming to Hawsted. She was at Lawshall, the contiguous parish, to which she rode from Melford, 5 Aug. 1578. This event is recorded in Lawshall Register. If the date of the book is 1587, the author took a good while to consider of his publication. But probably the date is mistaken. "Cambria, p. 160*, I see with regret, is to be continued. What can be expected from a man, who, when he was on the top of Cader Idris, could see nothing of the crater of an extinct volcano there, which is as conspicuous as the pond in Lincoln's Inn Fields. What trash does poor Cole's auction contain! Yet, I know not whether my neighbour George is not gone to be present at it, in spite of this winterly weather. JOHN CULLUM.” Hardwick House, May 18, 1784. "DEAR SIR. "I send you, according to promise, and as in duty and gratitude bound for your constant favours, some sketches, à ma façon, of some painted glass, which I observed in a handsome bow window, at Lord Sandwich's, at Hinchinbrook, in June 1771; and they are something a greater curiosity, as the public prints mentioned, a few years afterwards, that this window was broken to pieces by some officers, in a drunken frolick, from Huntingdon: and, I believe, it is now adorned with some arms of the Montagues, executed by Peckit of York.-Of the first crest Mr. Peck says, 'Oliver Cromwell, while he was yet only Lord General of the Parliament Forces, bore for his crest a demi-lion, holding in his paw a halbert, or general's pike. After he was made Lord Protector, he took away the halbert, and gave the demi-lion a diamond ring in his right paw, to signify his political marriage to the imperial crown of the three kingdoms. This I learn from a comparison of his sign manual when Lord General, with another sign manual of his when Lord Protector.' Memoirs of Cromwell, p. 130.-Mr. Peck seems to have refined too much upon Oliver's design in putting the ring instead of the pike into the lion's paw; for, if he did make that alteration, he only assumed the family cognisance, as appears by the crest here exhibited. J.C." "DEAR SIR, Hardwick House, July 6, 1784. "My typographical labours, thank Heaven, begin to draw towards a conclusion. The remaining part of the MS. which Mr. Nichols has, will, I suppose, be about two sheets of letter-press; and the Appendix, which is to give some account of the extraparochial spot on which I dwell, will furnish about as much. J. C." * See Gent, Mag. 1783. vol. LIII. p. 160.. LETTERS LETTERS OF FRANCIS GROSE*, Esq. F. S. A. to GEORGE ALLAN†, Esq. F. S. A. "DEAR SIR, Dec. 13, 1774. "I received the favour of yours, inclosing the Prints, for which I return you many thanks.—Next time I see Mr. Astle, I am to have a parcel from him of Charters and Seals, which he has caused to be engraved, and which he begs you to accept as a return for yours that I gave him some time ago. I find that, after being duly recommended, a man must hang up in the Antiquarian Society's room six weeks. I think you have already been suspended there four and a half, so that in a fortnight you will be elected. I will get all the Views I have done in the County of Durham, printed off on thin paper, as you desire; and shall take the first leisure hour to reduce the View of Darlington Church‡. At present I am fagging to fetch up the lost time during my peregrinations. Inclosed you have the specimens of writing I mentioned to you. I have some more things of that kind, which I will convey in the next frank. Mr. Astle desired me to tell you he knows a gentleman who has a prodigious Collection for the County of Durham, which he can get you a sight of when you come to town. I shall be much obliged to you if you will give that gentleman's memory a little jogg, who was so kind as to promise me the View of Finchale: at this time it would be doubly acceptable. I shall engrave Durham Cathedral as a frontispiece to my third volume.-Remember me to Dr. Alexander §. F. G." "P. S. Hereunder is the character of Anthony Bek, Bishop of Durham temp. E. I. from an original MS. of the Siege of Karlaverock in Scotland, 1300, preserved in the Cotton Library, Caligula A. XVIII. Many other Durham gentlemen are mentioned, "Par amours & par compagnie Car d'une propre conscience O eus fu jointe la maisnie Le noble Evesque de Doureaume Le plus vaillant Clerk de Roiaume Voire voire de Chrestiente, Si vous en dirai verité, Par coy se entendre me volez Sages fu et bien en parlez A tempres droituriers & chastes Ne onques riche home ne aprochastes Ki plus bel orderaste sa vie Si hautement se conseilloit A grant gens et a grands courtages; Non purquant si bien li sauvint Cent et seissante homes a armes Of whom see an account in vol. III. p. 656. + See before, p. *366. See before, p. 328. § Author of the History of Women, and a Lecture on Harrowgate Water. Y Y 2 "SIR |
