from the Secretary's office to the Examiner's office, he hopes to have more time for pursuing what is a very agreeable employment. I understand that his pencil has been of service to him in his department in the India-house, by recommending him to the notice of persons of influence there; and he has occasionally used it for the President of the Royal Society. 66 Among the Church notes which he sent to me since his late excursion, there is one I shall mention to you, though the circumstance in it which struck me as a peculiarity may not be novel to you. Linton Church, near Coxheath, is the place of sepulture of the Mann family; and on a monument is a tree painted in a large tablet, displaying a long pedigree, but now almost defaced.' Fisher imagines this to be of the age of Elizabeth. "Too true it is, that on the eve of the departed year there was a terrible and woeful catastrophe at Dartford powder-mills, nor have the newspapers increased the number of persons to whom it was fatal. Nine fragments of skulls, and other scattered relics, were collected, and being placed in five coffins, were interred in the upper burial-ground at Dartford on Saturday evening; and I understood that the trunk of another body has since been discovered at a greater distance from the mill than could have been expected, as also a part of a foot suspended on a tree. Of the eleven men, which are five more than were blown up by the explosion in October 1790, the body of one only could be ascertained. As the corning mill in which it happened was nearer to my house than the mills destroyed at that time, it was more felt by my servants(for I was sitting at Dartford), and on examining I find that it cracked one sash pane; but three panes were driven in at Mr. Tasker's house, which is close by Wilmington Church, an incident that rather surprised me, because it is situated so high above the level of the mill. The immediate cause of it will ever remain unknown, but the concussion was certainly the greater from the cakes being under the press; and but a short time previous to the blow upwards of forty-five barrels of powder had been removed. This manufacture is, alas! a most lucrative business to the proprietors, who cannot answer as speedily as they could wish the demands of their customers; and while the Christian rulers of so many European countries (our own not excepted) are averse to the taking one step towards a pacificatory negotiation, this abominable infernal composition must be in great request. "No other account have I had of the decease of our old friend Dr. Colman than from the public prints; but I am inclined to think it was rather unexpected, because Mr. George Currey, of Trinity-college, whose eldest brother is Fellow of Bene't, left Cambridge early on Tuesday morning, and had not heard of Dr. Colman's being indisposed; he on the contrary says, that he understood from his brother, that the Master was under an engagement to pass Friday evening with him, and VOL. VI. 2s7t according to the newspapers, he died that afternoon. From what Mr. James Currey intimated to his father, with whom he was at Dartford during the summer recess, Mr. Bradford, the senior Fellow and Tutor, will prefer the Rectory of Stalbridge to the Headship; and I conclude you are aware that, should he be elected Master, he is by Archbishop Tenison's will precluded from that living; and whether Mr. Douglas, who is the subtutor, and a very respectable man, will think the Mastership an object worthy his attention without being possessed of an additional benefice is rather doubtful. The revenue of the Mastership is not adequate to a post of that pre-eminence; and it may be some time before a living may fall, or the Premier have it in his power to make a suitable provision for him. Somewhat solicitous am I to know how this vacancy in the old House will be supplied, and I was in hopes that ere this Mr. James Currey would have apprised his father of what must be of consequence to the son; but perhaps he conceives it to be expedient to be upon the reserve while the affair is in suspense. For the credit of the Society the Fellows will not, I trust, elect an alien, as they did when Dr. Green, that Yorkshire tike, was brought from St. John's, and the Benedictines acquired the denomination of Cappadocians. "Since I wrote the above, a newspaper and a letter have been brought me. The former announces the Rev. Philip Douglas, B. D. to have been unanimously elected Master of the old House; and on the receipt of the latter I am become indebted to you for three unanswered epistles. "Till I read the second paragraph in p. 1148 of the Magazine for December, I was not aware that the late Mr. Knight* was possessed of a choice collection of medals and a series of English coins; nor does the article mention whether it was made by himself, or devolved to him from his father. If the latter were the case, Dr. Pegge, whilst Vicar of Godmersham, must have often examined this antique treasure. Mr. Austen, who, by the will of Mr. Knight, is to have the reversion of all his estates, and is to take the name of Knight, is a very distant cousin t. The two seats, viz. that of Godmersham-park and that of Chawton in Hampshire, are, however, devised to the widow for life, with, as it is said, a net £.4000 a year. "I am, dear Sir, yours sincerely, S. DENNE." Thomas Knight, Esq. of Godmersham-park, Kent; M. P. for that county in the Parliament which sat 1774-1780. +Mr. Knight was descended from the Austen family, but entirely through females; which of course made the connection obscure, and gave rise to groundless surmises, Mr. Denne's bints of which the editor has suppressed. It was Mr. Knight's mother's maternal grandmother that was by birth an Austen; she was great-grand-aunt to Mr. Knight's legatee, who was consequently his third cousin. His sister was the author of "Pride and Prejudice;" see Gent. Mag. C. ii. 596. 25. "DEAR SIR, Wilmington, March 2, 1795. "I have been apprised by Secretary Wrighte of his having exhibited the Upchurch Font, &c.; and as the Paper-marks are to precede the drawings of the other Fonts, you will have time to be rather more explicit touching the veil you wish to have drawn over the blessed Margaret in tenderness to my antiquarian reputation, a friendly innuendo that satisfies me of your thinking that my surmises concerning her are of too light and ludicrous a cast for a grave F. A.S. This being the case I am willing to accede to any alterations and omissions that you shall recommend; and for this purpose you will be pleased to return that part of the paper in which St. Margaret is noticed, and to subjoin to it your remarks. My real opinion is, that the Font is decorated with the bust of her as the tutelary saint of the Church, and on discovering that in a Cathedral the huge effigies of a Bishop had for years passed for an image of the Virgin Mary, it did not appear to me to be a very extravagant conceit, that in an age of collusion and ignorance the figure of a Prince or an Earl should have been metamorphosed into the portrait of a female saint. As to the coronet dug up in the Church-yard, I might have added, by way of illustration of my conjecture, from Archæologia, vol. V. p. 442, that an engraving of an elegant little crown of gold, found on new paving the Tower of London in 1772, was supposed by the President, who communicated it to the Society, to have been intended to adorn the head of a small statue of the Virgin Mary, or some other Saint which had been placed in an oratory or private Chapel.' I am not, however, at all partial to my surmise, and shall readily acquiesce in any change that you shall suggest. "The late Alderman Sawbridge was my school-fellow and co-boarder in the Master's house at Canterbury. I wish that his family may not have cause to regret that from a country gentleman he would become a citizen and eke Parliament man. So many contested elections as he was obliged to fight his way through must have been attended with a very heavy expense; and report says, that his alliance with an Alderman's daughter * was not much to his pecuniary interest. No notice was taken in the paper of his age, but I judge him to have entered into his grand climacteric. "It is a heavy imposition on the Chaplain of the House of Commons to be obliged to publish three Sermons on January the 30th. He merits for his task a decanal stall, though it is likely a Prebend of Canterbury will be his portion. You must have noticed that the Archbishop has collated his son to the stall vacant by the decease of Dr. Berkeley; and I understand that the young dignitary is soon to be married to a daughter of Lord Errol †, though among the many accomplishments of which it * Sir William Stevenson. + The Rev. Geo. Moore married Lady Maria-Elizabeth Hay, June 29,1795. may be presumed she is possessed of, she is in want of one that many judge requisite to render the marriage state happy, viz. a fortune. Since the demise of Archdeacon Balguy, Bishop Hurd, I suspect, may be the only disciple remaining of the Warburtonian school; and he, according to an account which a friend of mine received of him in May last, is in a very tottering state. "The Bishop of Bristol very kindly admitted Bishop Stuart's plea of residence at Windsor, and out of course preached before the House of Peers on the Fast-day. Bishop Buller's recent loss of a son, killed in one of the late unfortunate engagements, disqualified him from undertaking an employment which necessarily would have obtruded on his mind distressful reflections. "When you return the sheet in which the marvellous feats of St. Margaret are displayed by Vida the immortal, and others, in order to guard against mistakes, may it not be as well for you to draw your pen through the passages that are exceptionable? I have not the least objection to omitting the whole I have written from the account of St. Margaret's Font to the description of the Font in Gillingham. The intermediate paragraphs were considered by me as episodical; and added from a suspicion that our brethren might complain they had had quantum sufficit of Fonts as well as of Stone Seats; and I was at the same time unwilling to disappoint Fisher, who is improving as a delineator. "I am just returned from my morning walk to Dartford with my great coat covered with snow. At Dartford I heard that the remains of Alderman Sawbridge were conveyed with pomp through that town yesterday afternoon. "I remain, truly yours, S. DENNE." 26. "DEAR SIR, Wilmington, March 12, 1795. "The morning after I was favoured with yours of the 6th current, I had a few minutes' chat with brother Latham, (for an F. A. S. is one of the many appendages to his name,) who expressed his satisfaction at your having acceded to the proposal of a change of his Synopsis of Birds for your Sepulchral Monuinents; and as his is a very curious work, though not in your line of pursuit, and well executed, I am persuaded you will not have cause to regret a compliance with his offer. In the new list of the Members of Society of Antiquaries, John Latham's name will be dignified and distinguished with a variety of abbreviations pursuant to a hint suggested to Mr. Deputy at the Cicero's Head; and my friend having shown me the instrument of his association to one of the honourable fraternities alluded to, I was at the trouble of transcribing it because it was new I have also under a notion that it may be novel to you. to me; Imperialis Academiæ Leopoldino-Carolina Naturæ Curiosorum Pharmacia, Chirurgiæ, et artis obstetricia Practico Reg. Soc. Scient. Lond., Soc. Antiquar., ac Linnean. Londin, Sod., Societat. Chirurgor. Londin. Soc. Incorporat., et Societ. Naturæ Scructator. Beroliens. Sodali Honorario. S. P. D. Quod statim a primordiis suis symbolum elegit Academia nostra NUNQUAM ОTIOSUS, hoc ipsum ut cuncti in eamdem recepti vel recipiendi, sedulo observarint, et perpetuo observent, vehementer exoptat, atque illud quoque de iis quos noviter ad collegium suum invitat, aut qui generoso instinctu ad societatem feruntur, aut qui a collegis commendati sunt, subsumit. Sunt enim inexhaustæ rerum naturæ, et medicæ scientiæ, et artis divitiæ, ut cuilibet prostet aliquid, in quo industria sua se exercent. Atque cum unius hominis, aut paucorum, non sit in tantum tamque amplissimum campum excurrere, et cuncta in eo perscrutari, et sint mille species, et rerum diacolor usus; utique complurium bonarum mentium inclinatione, labore strenuo, et consociatione opus est. Quapropter non poterit non exoptatus gratusque evenire nobis accessus tuus, vir doctissime atque experientissime! Quo magis eruditio tua, et in perscrutandis naturæ operibus admirandis, præcipue vero in indagandis avium insectorumque speciebus, studium, non nobis solum, sed toto orbi literario cognita perspectaque jam exsistunt. Esto igitur ex merito nunc quoque noster! Esto Academiæ Cæsareæ Naturæ Curiosorum decus et augmentum, macte virtute tua et industria, et accipe in signum nostri ordinis, cui te nunc adscribo, ex antiqua nostra consuetudine, cognomen ARISTOPHILI, quo collegam amicissimum te hodie primum salutamus. Salve in consortio nostro! Salve inquam, et effice ut in posterum tua, nunquam otiosa, suavi doctaque sodalitate læti frui diu queamus. Vale. Dabam Erlangæ d. v1 Octobris A. R. S. CIOIOCCLXXXXIIII. D. Io. Christianus Daniel Schreber, S. R. I. Nobilis, Acad. Imper. Nat. Cur. Præses, Consiliarius Archiater. et Comes Palatinus Cæsareus rel. "Non Otiosus is, I think, a well adapted motto for a scientific society; and suitable would it be were it subjoined to the armorial shield of Mr. Latham, who is always busy. In giving him the name of Aristophilus, Præses Schreber and Co. do not appear to me to have been peculiarly fortunate, it not being a denomination so appropriate as it ought. Surely Ornithophilus, or Ornitholegus, would have been more characteristic for a naturalist who was remarkably assiduous in the collecting of birds, judicious in his mode of preserving them, and skilful in his representation of them. The British Critic, in the review VOL. VI. 2 T |