him a strange thing to find such letters as these written with the correctness of a scholar; to which Barnard replied, that a man might be very learned and very poor: to which he might have added, that he might be very daring and very wicked. The Duke then shewed him the 4th letter, in which his name was mentioned: upon which Barnard said, "It is very odd; my father was then out of town." This speech the Duke thought remarkable, because though Barnard said his father was then out of town, the letter was without a date. The Duke then told him, that if he was innocent, it behoved him, more than his Grace, to discover the writer of the letters, especially the last; upon which he gave the Duke a smile, and went away.

How these circumstances came to the knowledge of Mr. Fielding, does not appear; but Fielding soon after took Mr. Barnard into custody, and he was tried the last sessions at the Old Bailey for sending a threatening letter, contrary to the statute.

In the account of the trial, as it is printed in the Sessions Paper, there is no mention of any evidence to prove the letters to be Mr. Barnard's hand-writing, nor indeed any evidence to prove that he was the writer of them; but his being in Hyde-park and in the Abbey at the times when the writers of the first and second letters appointed the Duke to meet him there.

It seems, however, to be incumbent upon Mr. Barnard, to shew how he came to be at those places just at those times; and this he has done in a very particular manner, supported by very credible testimony.

Thursday, May 11, 1758, at the Old Bailey Sessions, the remarkable trial of young Mr. Barnard, for writing the letters, above alluded to, to the Duke of Marlborough, came, on. What relates to the charge against him has already been narrated. What he urged in his defence was as follows: he proved that on the Sunday morning mentioned in the first letter to the Duke, his father ordered him to go to Kensington to the solicitor of the turnpike to know whether the treasurer of the turnpike had not paid some money for his use that, in consequence of this order he did go to Kenşington, saw the solicitor to the turnpike there, dined afterwards with his uncle, at his house at Kensington, in company with several other persons, to whom he related the particular of the Duke's coming up to him in Hyde-park,

and asking if he had any thing to say to him. This is attested by Barnard the father, who gave him orders to go to Kensington, by the person to whom he went, by his uncle with whom he dined, and several others that were at the same table.

As to his being in the Abbey, he proved that Mr. James Greenwood, a relation, a brewer at Deptford, being at breakfast with him, on the Sunday mentioned in the second letter, at his father's, where he had lain the night before, desired him to get himself dressed, and go with him into the Park: that he did not comply till after much solicitation, and that when they came to the end of Henry the VIIth's chapel, Mr. Barnard would have gone into the Park, without going through the Abbey, if Mr. Greenwood, had not insisted on the contrary, as he had never seen Gen. Hargrave's monument. This Mr. Greenwood was that good-looking man whom the Duke says he saw come into the Abbey with Mr. Barnard. As Barnard had told Greenwood the strange circumstance of the Duke's speaking to him in the Park, Greenwood, as soon as he saw the Duke, whom he knew, told Barnard who he was: for Barnard being very nearsighted had not seen him, and if he had, would not have known him. Mr. Greenwood observing the Duke to come up to him, and pass him several times, supposed he had a mind to speak to Mr. Barnard, but would not do it till he was alone, and for that reason he left him and went into the choir. These facts are attested by Mr. Greenwood, the only person to whom they could be known, and it should be observed, that Mr. Barnard could not appoint a meeting on these days, in consequence of his having business which at those times would call him to the places mentioned, because he did not know of his going either to the Park or the Abbey till the very day on which he went.

Mr. Barnard also proved, by unexceptionable witnesses, that he mentioned the strange circumstances of the Duke's meeting and speaking to him both in the Park, and in the Abbey, among his friends and acquaintance, openly on the day when they happened, and very frequently afterwards: that his father is established in a very reputable and profit able business, in which his son is likely to succeed him, be ing extremely capable of the employment, and very diligent in it. It is also proved by several persons of the highest character, particularly Dr. Markham, the present worthy inaster of Westminster school, that he is in plentiful circumstances, very far from being in any exigence which might urge him to obtain money at such a risk, not only of

his reputation but his life; that his conduct has been always irreproachable, and his fidelity often tried.

The fourth letter still remains an inscrutable mystery. No man could imagine from what Mr. Barnard had said from time to time, concerning the Duke's behaviour to him, that he was acquainted with some secrets which nearly concerned his Grace's safety, and why any person who might hear that the Duke had received threatening letters, without knowing from whom, should mention Mr. Barnard, cannot easily be guessed. The only conjecture that seems probable, if on such an occasion a conjecture may be allowed, is that some officious person, who had received some slight information. of the Duke's business at the Abbey, and observed him speak to Mr. Barnard, might watch him home, and taking for granted that if he should, in consequence of this information, be detected in any evil design, the informer, when ever he should think fit to reveal himself, would be rewarded, might be induced to make the information at a venture, and conceal himself till the event should be known.

As to the Duke he appears to have acted with the utmost tenderness and generosity through the whole affair; to have undertaken the prosecution purely from public principles, and to have been more desirous that the prisoner should appear innocent than guilty.

1758, May.

XXVIII. Unlikeness of Shakespeare's Busts.

MR. URBAN,

Stratford-upon-Avon, May 30, 1759. A DOUBT of a new kind, and not unworthy of notice, has arisen among some, whether the old monumental bust of Shakespeare, in the collegiate church of Stratford-uponAvon, Warwickshire, had any resemblance of the bard: but I find not this doubt to have taken date before the public regard shewn to his memory, by erecting for him the curious cenotaph in Westminster Abbey: the statue in that honorary monument is really in a noble attitude, and excites an awful admiration in the beholder; the face is venerable, and well expresses that intenseness of serious thought, which the Poet must be supposed to have sometimes had.

The face on the Stratford monument bears very little, if any resemblance, to that at Westminster; the air of it is indeed somewhat thoughtful, but then it seems to arise from

a cheerfulness of thought, which, I hope, it will be allowed Shakespeare was no stranger to. However this be, as the faces on the two monuments are unlike each other, the admirers of that at Westminster only, will have it, that the country figure differs as much from the likeness of the original, as it does from the face in the Abbey, and so far endeavour to deprive it of its merit: this is a derogation I can by no means allow, and that for the following reasons:Shakespeare died at the age of 53. The unanimous tradition is, that by the uncommon bounty of the then Earl of Southampton, he was enabled to purchase a house and land at Stratford, the place of his nativity: to which place, after quitting the public stage, he retired, and lived cheerfully amongst his friends some time before his death. If we consider these circumstances aright, that Shakespeare's disposition was cheerful, and that he died before he could be said to be an old man, the Stratford figure is no improper representation of him.

The exact time when the country monument was erected is now unknown; but, I presume, it was done by his executor, or relations, probably while his features were fresh in every one's memory, and perhaps with the assistance of an original picture too. These are no unreasonable suppositions, and which, I think, cannot easily be overthrown, especially when corroborated (as I hope to prove they are) by the following observation, not hitherto made, that I know of, by any one.

Facing the title page of one of the folio editions of Shakespeare's Works, there is a head of him engraved by one Martin Droeshout, a Dutchman, and underneath this cut appear the following lines, written by Ben Jonson, who personally knew, and was familiarly acquainted with our

Poet.

The figure that thou here see'st put,
It was for gentle Shakespeare cut;
In which the graver had a strife
With nature, to out-do the life.
O could he but have drawn his wit
As well in brass as he hath hit

His face, the print would then surpass
All that was ever writ in brass.
But since he cannot, reader, look

Not on his picture, but his book.

B. J.

In these verses Ben plainly asserts, that if the engraver could have drawn Shakespeare's wit in brass, as well

as he has done his face, the performance would have been preferable to every thing of the kind; a convincing proof how great a likeness he knew there was between the poet and that picture of him.

Now, if we compare this picture with the face on the Stratford monument, there will be found as great a resemblance as perhaps can well be betwixt a statue and a picture, except that the hair is described rather shorter and straiter on the latter, than on the former; and yet this difference will not, I dare say, be material enough to justify the doubt I have attempted to remove; and, if not, then I hope what I have here advanced will induce those gentlemen, who have not thought so well of the Stratford monument, to have a better opinion of it for the time to come.

1759, June.

J. G.

XXIX. Contrivance for Muscular Exercise.

Bagnio-court, Newgate-street, Oct. 23.

MR. URBAN, MODERATE exercise is one of the necessary means of health; but the employments of many people oblige them to a sedentary life; and in the winter seasons valetudinary persons are often kept at home by the inclemency of the weather: I propose therefore a kind of exercise which I have found very beneficial to myself, and which may be used by persons of all constitutions, ages, and conditions, in all houses, and in all seasons, by which all the benefits that can result from common exercises may easily be obtained.

I have two box pulleys with wood screws fixed in the ceiling of a room, at the distance of about three feet, or three and a half, and a sliding line, made of what is called curtain line, and two handles made of cocoa-wood, four inches and a half long, and bored through.

This apparatus cost me two shillings and two-pence. The sliding line passes through one handle, then over the pulleys, and through the other handle, and at each end it is tied with a slip-knot, that the handles may be let higher or lower, according to the height of the person who is to

exercise.

When I use this exercise, I begin, with lifting up my