1826.]
Mr. URBAN,

THE

Lea Church, Lincolnshire.-Antient Statue.

Sept. 6. HE village of Lea or Ley, so call ed from its marshy meadows, watered by the river Trent, is situated two miles from Gainsborough, in the South division of the Wapentake of Corringham, in the parts of Lindsey, in the county of Lincoln. The living, a rectory of the value of 9l. 4s. 10d. in the King's books, is in the patronage of Sir Charles John Anderson, bart.

The Church, of which the inclosed is a representation (see Plate II.) is situated on a knoll above the village, and from the neatness with which both it and the church-yard are kept, has a very pleasing appearance. It is dedicated to St. Helen, and is chiefly built of a shelly stone found in the neighbourhood; but the buttresses, pinnacles, and windows, are composed of Ancaster stone, of which many of the beautiful churches in the fens are wholly built, exhibiting masonry unrivalled, both for solidity and beauty. It consists of a tower, nave, chancel, and one North aile only, though there are traces of some other building still apparent in the South wall. Few village churches exhibit more variety than this in the form and architecture of the windows. The windows in the chancel, together with an archway and piscina in a pew adjoining, appear to have been executed in the 13th century; as does the arch of the churchdoor, which was removed from the North wall to supply the place of a brick porch, when the building was repaired in 1811. The rest of the windows, though of different shapes and with different ornaments, are of the 14th and 15th centuries, when Gothic architecture was assuming a more decorated character. In the two smallest are some fragments of stained glass, which having been cleaned and put up in patterns, has a pretty effect.

The old font was very handsome, but it fell to pieces when it was taken down, and by the unskilfulness of the workmen, could not be restored; its place is now supplied by one very infe

rior.

This river has the same peculiarity with the Severn, in regard to its tide, which comes up beyond Lea in one or two waves, sometimes two or three feet high. It is called by the people in the neighbourhood, the Eager.

GENT. MAG. September, 1826.

209

Under an arch in the chancel is a very perfect monument of a knight in armour recumbent, with his legs crossed, resting on a lion. When this oc, curs, according to Fosbroke, it signifies that the individual has been a crusader. There is no tradition, nor are there any data to go by, which can in the least enable me to discover who this was.

About half a mile to the East of Lea Church, are a moated piece of ground and the remains of fish-ponds, the site of the Cistertian Priory of Hevenynge, which was dissolved temp. Hen. VIII. where (vide Leland's Collectanea) were some monuments of the D'Arcys, who resided at Knaith, a mile South of Lea. It does not seem improbable that the tomb in question is one of these, removed from Hevenynge at the time of its dissolution, as upon an examination beneath it some years ago, neither coffin or inscription was found. At any rate, on these occasions conjecture is the only substitute for truth.

Besides this, there are no ancient monuments, but a few tablets to some of the Andersons, who have had possessions here since the time of Elizabeth, when Sir Edward Anderson, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, purchased part of the lordship of Lea,

The Thorolds, who have extensive property in the South of Lincolnshire, had land here till lately, and a tomb to a Mrs. Thorold is to be seen in the church-yard.

The church tower is well proportioned, and contains a clock and four bells. The Church was fitted up with great neatness in 1811, when an or gan, part of which was built by the famous Father Smith, was erected. Indeed the whole building, combined with the rural scenery around, exhibits a good specimen of an English village Church.

Mr. URBAN,

A.

Gloucester Terrace, Hoxton, Sept. 7, THE fragment of which I inclose

you a pencil sketch, (see Plate II.) was found among the foundations lately removed for the purpose of forming the new street, now called Liverpool-street, which unites the antient site of Moorfields with Bishopsgatestreet in London. It is of white marble, and measures about three feet six

inches in height. Perhaps some of
your London Correspondents will feel
disposed to speculate on its original
destination.
T. FISHER.

Mr. URBAN,

together with the prevailing colour of
the light of each, and the Differential
Refraction. The Table is curious, and
may interest such of your readers as
are fond of Astronomy, but the cause
of the discrepancy in the observations,
and its explanation by means of the
the air, and in the refrangible rays of
differences in the refracting power of
each Star, must be reserved for a fu-
ture occasion.
T. F..

Aug. 12. THE in The Declination of HE subjoined Table exhibits the Thirteen of the principal fixed Stars, according to four several computations, DECLINATION of STARS in their distance in degrees, minutes, and seconds N. or S. of the Equator. The observed declination of Stars differs according to Astronomers at different times and places; the following Table shews their discrepancies in a few select instances.

1826.]
Mr. URBAN,

1

On the Chronology of the Egyptian History.

Sept. 3. (Continued from Part I. p. 595). PROCEED to the consideration of Mr. Gibbon's objections to Sir Isaac's chronology of the Egyptian History, a subject perhaps of all others involved in the greatest obscurity.

1. "It is difficult to credit the new system, with respect to the deified kings of Egypt, such as Ammon and Osiris, &c. Can we believe that they had been only known 500 years when Herodotus visited Egypt? or that the priests had extended the reign of their Gods to above 15,000 years, and concealed all historical truth under a veil of allegory, without any obstruction from the genealogy of the companions of Sesostris, at a time when the knowledge of letters, which Thout had discovered under Osiris, furnished a method of transmitting events to posterity with greater accuracy than hieroglyphics? Newton appears to have been deceived by the vanity of the Greeks, which was only equalled by their ignorance of their origin. They, being unable to extend it as far as the Egyptians, endeavoured to reduce that of the latter, and to prove that the Egyptian gods were descended from their heroes, or that they were contemporaries.

2. Yet these fables will furnish us with powerful arguments to confute the new system. Cecrops introduced the worship of Minerva from Sais, where she had long been adored in Egypt, into Greece. Cecrops landed in Egypt B.C. 1080; but Minerva, or Myrina, according to Newton, was the Queen of the Amazons, who accompanied Osiris in his expeditions, B.C. 974. Mars and Neptune (Chron. Par. epoch 2,) pleaded before the court of Areopagus in the reign of Cranaus. I only conclude from this fable that at that time the name and worship of these deities was known in Greece; but according to Newton they were the same as Osiris and Typhon, who lived nearly 100 years after Cranaus."

I. Herodotus made his enquiries into the Egyptian History about 455 B.C. or 200 years after the first communication between the Greeks and Egyptians. At that time they were subject to the Persians, and had continued so above 70 years. The interpreters (as he informs us, lib. 2, cap. 152-4) were descended from the Ionians and Carians, by whose aid Psammetichus became sole monarch of Egypt about 651 B.C. and in his time (ib. 164) formed one of the seven classes into which the Egyptians were divided. In the preceding part of his history, whatever he relates is upon the authority of the priests, and he generally adds, wds

:

211

ἔλεγον γενεσθαι, or some equivalent expressions. Having mentioned the death of Sethon, he adds, "These things then the Egyptians themselves relate. I shall now proceed to relate what other nations, no less than they, acknowledge to have been done in Egypt," ibid. 147; and again having mentioned the settlement of the Greek mercenaries, adds: "From their first establishment, the Greeks had so constant a communication with them, that we know with certainty all that has happened in Egypt since the reign of Psammetichus," ibid. 154.

By these observations we may easily perceive upon what authority the early history of Egypt depends, and in what obscurity they were involved even 450 that the later historians can throw any years B.C. How then can we expect additional light on the subject, when they lived, after the priests had corrupted their antiquities much more than they had done in the days of Herodotus?" To the synchronizing histories of the Jews and Greeks then must we refer, and endeavour by them Herodotus. to explain the accounts delivered by

First, however, it will be necessary to prove Bacchus and Sesostris to be the same person. That Bacchus is the Egyptian Osiris we learn from Herodotus (II. 42 and 144), and Tibullus (I. 2); and Diodorus (I. p. 7) informs us, that Orpheus and Eumolpus, called Osiris, Dionysus, and Sirius. Newton (p. 193-4) concludes him to be the same as Sesostris from the following argu

ments.

1. They were kings of all Egypt, and reigned at Thebes, which they

adorned.

2. They were powerful by sea and land, and carried their conquests as far as India.

3. They crossed the Hellespont, and were in danger of losing their armies there.

4. They conquered Thrace, and thence returned to Egypt.

5. They left pillars with inscriptions in all their conquests.

6. The sacred history admits of no Egyptian conqueror of Palestine before Sesack or Sesostris.

Bacchus lived two or three generations before the Trojan War; Proteus, who reigned in Egypt at that time, succeeded the S. of Sesostris. Herod. lib. 2, cap. 111-3.