See" Registrum Roffense," p. 923; and also the Custumale." He was happy in a retentive memory, and could quote whole pages of his favourite Pope with the utmost facility. He was courteous, but not courtly, in his manners; hospitable, but not extravagant, at his table; skilful and curious in his garden; intelligent and communicative in his library; social, elegant, and informing in his general conversation, and on antiquarian topics almost an enthusiast. These facts are stated from an intimate acquaintance and attentive observation of many years; and the writer of this article is well warranted in asserting that Mr. Thorpe, who lived in the genuine style of our old English gentry, was truly venerated by his family, and respected by a numerous circle of friends, beyond the common rank.

The preceding account of Mr. Thorpe and his family produced the following letter:-"The late Mrs. Thorpe, whose death you have mentioned with a merited eulogy on the deceased, was buried in a vault in Bexley churchyard, contiguous to a wall, which is a boundary of the premises of Highstreet-house, built by Mr. Thorpe; and on a tablet of black mar ble, fixed to the wall, is the following inscription: "D.O. M.

The Fossil-stone beneath covers the remains of CATHARINA, wife of JOHN THORPE, M.A. F.S.A. Pray disturb not her ashes."

This fossil-stone was brought from Cockleshell bank, near Green-street Green, or from some bank of a similar kind in Bexley parish, whose strata are minutely described in "Antiquities within the Diocese of Rochester," subjoined to Custumale Roffense, pp. 254, 5. As Mr. Thorpe died at Chippenham, it cannot be matter of surprize that he should be averse to giving his friends the trouble of conveying his remains more than an hundred miles. But why did not the tree lie where it fell, instead of being drawn a few miles to Harden Huish? Considering the short

residence of my worthy friend in Wilts, Harden Huish must have been to him a novel parish. But, perhaps, some information he had acquired respecting its antient history, or some vestiges he had traced of a testaceous soil, might occasion his chusing this spot for a place of interment. He was, as you have truly observed, on Antiquarian topicks, almost an enthusiast; and, in this instance, he might be willing to

shew

"He felt his ruling passion strong in death."

When, by his direction, a fossil of marine exuviœ was made the key-stone of the sepulchral vault in Bexley church-yard, it doubtless was his intention that it should cover, and keep undisturbed, the dust of John Thorpe, as well as the ashes of Catharina. W. & D."*

XVI. EDWARD HASTED, ESQ.† was the only son of Edward Hasted, of Hawley, Kent, esq. barrister at law; descended paternally from the noble family of Clifford, as he was maternally from the antient and knightly family of the Dingleys of Woolverton, in the Isle of Wight. His laborious History of Kent took him up more than 40 years, during the whole series of which he spared neither pains nor expence to bring it to maturity; and the reputation which it still maintains in the judgment of the publick, is the best proof of its merits. Notwithstanding his attention to this his favourite object during the whole of the above time, he acted as a magistrate and a deputy lieu

The usual signature of his friend Mr. Denne; see p. 531. • "I request my Executor to cause the following insertion, immediately after my death, to be sent for that purpose to the Publisher of the Gentleman's Magazine, to be inserted in the Obituary of the next Magazine after my death; and I am sure my much-respected friend Mr. Nichols will have the goodness to consent to it. EDWARD HASTED."

tenant

tenant for the county of Kent with uncommon zeal and activity. He was F. R. S. and S. A. In the latter part of his life he felt the pressure of adverse fortune, which obliged him to quit his residence in Kent, after which he lived in obscure retirement, and for some time in the environs of London, noticed by a few valuable friends, from whom het received constant tokens of benevolent friendship, as having known him in more fortunate circumstances, several of whom are of the rank of Nobility, and of high estimation in life. A few years ago, his honourable and highly respected patron and friend, the Earl of Radnor, presented him to the Mastership of the Hospital at Corsham in Wiltshire (a most desirable asylum), to which he then removed; and, having obtained, a few years ago, the Chancellor's decree for the recovery of his estates in Kent, of which he had been defrauded, it enabled him again to enjoy the sweets of an independent competence during the remainder of his life. He died at the Master's Lodge of the Lady Hungerford's Hospital, in Corsham, Wilts, at the advanced age of 80, Jan. 14, 1812. By Anne his wife, who died in 1803, Mr. Hasted left four sons and two daughters, of whom the eldest son is now a respectable clergyman, vicar of Hollingborne, with the chapel of Hucking annexed, near Maidstone, in Kent, and in the Commission of the Peace for that County.

XVII. THE REV. THOMAS RUDD

was rector of Washington, in the County of Durham; and wrote the ingenious disquisition proving Symeon, and not Turgot, to be the author of the History of the Church of Durham, published by Bedford, and which is prefixed to that Edition. It has always been supposed this gentleman left many valuable MSS. relating to the County of Durham, which are in the hands of his grandson, Wm. Rudd, esq. now living at Durham.

XVIII. The Rev. Archdeacon JOHN DENNE descended from a family of good note in the county of Kent, which was seated at Denne-hill in the parish of Kingston, in that county, so long ago as the reign of Edward the Confessor; and there conti-, nued in a direct line of male issue till 1656; nay, longer in the name, by the marriage of a collateral. branch (Vincent Denne, Esq. Serjeant at Law) with Mary, a coheiress in the direct line, in whose female issue it ended in 1693.

"From this antient stem sprung many shoots, that were planted at different times and places through that county; whereof there was one at Littlebourne, in the time of Henry VII. from which came John Denne, Gent. who had the place of Woodreve to the See of Canterbury in these parts, by a patent from Archbishop Tenison *."

Dr. John Denne, his eldest son, was born at Littlebourne, May 25, 1693; brought up at the free school of Sandwich and Canterbury; admitted of Ben'et College, Feb. 25, 1708; and afterwards a scholar of that House. He proceeded B. A. 1712, M. A. and Fellow 1716, S. T. P. 1728; joint Tutor of the College with Dr. Thomas [afterwards Archbishop] Herring; presented by the College, to the perpetual curacy of St. Benedict's church, Cambridget; rector of Norton Davy, or Green's Norton, co. Northampton, 1721, which he exchanged for the vicarage of St. Leonard, Shoreditch, 1723; Preacher of Boyle's Lectures 1725-1728; Archdeacon and Prebendary of Rochester 1728, on the presentation of Bishop

* What concerns the antient and flourishing state of this family is confirmed by some MS Papers belonging to it; and may `be seen in Philpott's "Villare Cantianum," Weever's Funeral Monuments; Collins's Peerage; in the Preface to Somner's Antiquities of Canterbury; and in a very remarkable inscription on the South wall of the Temple Church, on John Denne, a Barrister, who died Jan. 16, 1648, æt. 32, which is printed in Dugdale's "Origines Juridiciales,” p. 175.

+ Masters's History of Bene't College, p. 276.

"At the time of his becoming a member, not a few of its muniments and papers were in much confusion; these he digested,

and

Bradford, to whom he had been many years domestic chaplain, and whose daughter, Susannah, he mar

and by that means rendered the management of the affairs of the Dean and Chapter easy to his contemporaries and their successors. He is well known to have been very conversant in our ecclesiastical history; and this employment afforded him an opportunity of increasing his knowledge in it, and of gratifying his inclination 'to other antiquarian researches. The indefatigable and judicious author of British Topography (vol. II. p. 373.) acknowledges that his passion for the pursuits of antiquity was fostered within the walls of Bene't College, and observes that other Antiquaries have obligation to the same seminary. In which number Dr. Denne may be classed: for, whilst a Fellow of that Society he transmitted to Mr. Lewis, from MSS in the libraries of the University of Cambridge, many useful materials for his Life of Wicliff; and when that learned Divine was afterwards engaged in drawing up his History of the Isle of Tenet, he applied to Mr. Denne for all the pertinent information that could be collected from the MSS. bequeathed to his college by Archbishop Parker. The care and diligence of Dr. Denne in collating the Textus Roffensis, and in subjoining to his copy of Hearne's edition such additions and remarks as would elucidate it, have been commended by Mr. Pegge (Bibl. Top. Brit. No. XV.)

"In examining the archives of the church, no grant, lease, or chartulary, seems to have escaped his notice. Almost all of them were endorsed by him, and from a great many of them he made extracts. His enquiries were not however confined to the muniments of the Dean and Chapter. The registers in the office of the Bishop of the diocese, their consistorial acts, and the minutes of the Archdeacon's Court, were likewise closely inspected. The late Dr. Thorpe saved him the trouble of searching many of the wills, by obliging him with the perusal of the transcripts he had from them. The acts of the courts of the Bishops and Archdeacons, which lay loose and dispersed in the office, were arranged by him and bound up in volumes. And in the opinion of Bishop Gibson, who was apprized of many of the contents, there are few registries of our Ecclesiastical Courts, that can furnish a more satisfactory report of proceedings in them previous to the Reformation.

"Dr. Denne, in his enquiries, had doubtless his first view to the discovering and ascertaining of the revenues, rights, privileges, and usages of the body corporate of which he was a member, and of the judicial office which he held in this diocese. But it was his further intention to make collections for a History of the Church of Rochester, concerning which very little was generally known in his time. With the same purpose he noted references to whatever printed books he had of his own in which that church was named, and copied largely from other books and manuscripts that accidentally fell in his way. That he often had it in his

thoughts