e wha tr. the Le giflature, feconded by the clergy and medical profeffion, would foon carry the fruits of this difcovery to the higheft pitch of which it is capable, that is, to the utter extinction of che finall-pox, which, for the laft 700 years, has been the most afflicting fcourge of Chriftendom, and has deftroyed many more of the human fpecies, particularly of the young and hopeful, than peftilénce and famine united. To thofe who may urge that we have already an antidote to the finallpox in its own inoculation, let it be remembered, that, however falutary this practice may be to thofe who actually undergo it, it is not fo to the community at large; for it appears from the Bills of Mortality, that as many die of the fmall-pox in our time as before the introduction of inoculation; owing, no doubt, to its being partially practifed, and to its extending the cafual infection among thofe who would not otherwife be expofed to it, and who might have efcaped for life, as was frequently the cafe before the introduction of inoculation. The infertion of this in your diffufive Mifcellany, while it will propagate ufeful truth, will at the fame time oblige your reader, BENEVOLUS. Mr. URBAN, Croydon, March 4. IF your readers, particularly thofe whofe tafte and ftudies lead them to the investigation of botanical curiofities, recollect the letter which I fent you, in the fpring of laft year, on the fubject of what you well intituled a Vegetable Phenomenon, they may, perhaps, with to know the fate of the plant which had fo fingularly deviated from the common laws of vegetation. To fave them the trouble of a reference to my former letter, I fhall here recapitulate the leading facts; viz. that the Thrub, an American double-bloffomed thorn, was planted in my pleafureground in October 1798; that through the whole of the year 1799, it remained in a fiate of torpor and inaction, apperently dead; and that, at the end of fifteen months, viz. in January 1800, it broke out into the luxuriance of ve getation, in which flate it actually was at the time of my addreffing you on the fubject, (February 23, 1800. See vol. LXX. p. 316.) I then afked of your more learned correfpondents, whether in their opinion I was to expect a fecond foliage in 1800, that which then adorned the plant being an arrear of 1799, or whether I had been fo fortunate as to procure a flip of the celebrated Glaftenbury thorn? Well, Mr. Urban, the leaf, in defiance of much fevere weather and a Northern afpect, not only flourished through the remainder of the Winter, but exhibited early in March a few imperfect flowers, which with their leaves died away early in May. During the fummer the tree again appeared, as before, to be perfectly dead. The withered leaves which had fprouted in winter remained on the tree, dry and faplefs; and no attempt at vegetation took place at the ordinary period when plants of this fpecies are accuftomed to exhibit leaves and flowers. My gardener would have thrown it away in autumn as dead; but I would not confent to fo decifive a measure. The event has juftified my caution. After remaining lifelefs two fummers, and flourishing one winter, my capri-, cious thrub is preparing to fall into the regular courfe of annual vegetation, being already in bud, with the appearance of an abundant difplay of flowers. I have been led into more length than I expected; but the fingularity of the fubject will, I hope, plead in my excufe. W. E. R. P. 9. Some curious particulars relative to St. John's hofpital, Bedford, founded by Robert de Paris, deftroyed by the fire at the Cotton library, was a particular" of it, Tib. E. VIII. 71. 66 The eftablishment [of Grey friars] furnishes a fignal proof of the mutations to which all temporary polletlions are fubjected." We do not want general obfervations as make-weights in a work of this kind, nor words borrowed from Latin when Englith will do as wellchanges for mutations. The fame applies to the reflections on Harpur's charity, pp. 11, 12, Facts, narrative, and defeription, are all that are required. Bunyan commenced preacher, and continued that avocation, p. 15. "The crofs and memorials (or rather inftruments) of the paffion could not be the arms of any religious houfe. On a feal of Eliz. Boyville, abbefs of Elaftow abbey, abbey, were the Virgin and child, and St. Helen, each under a canopy, and under them a perton praying" but what fhield of arins is not faid. Is not a road iffaing from Dunftaple, on the North fide of the church," the prefent turnpike high road that paffes through the town? The oldeft houfes in the town do not exceed the time of Elizabeth. (p. 17.) In what part of England is cowbafhen provincial language? (p. 18.) Mr. Grofe makes it South country, equivalent to barton. And to what purpose of English topography lines from M. P. Andrews, efq. on itraw bonnets? "A church roof of oak, finely carved with knots of flowers, &c. the heams fupported by angels horizontal and perpendicular" (p. 19), is not uncommon, or peculiar to Duntable. Bp. Gibfon was not the laft who did not “exert a,little common fenfe to understand the Datable epitaph. (p. 21.) Mr. Pennant, from the Digby pedigree, expofed his own ignorance more completely. (See Sepulchral MoHaments of Great Britain, II. 193, 194) I remember that traveller making a cobler in Dunstable ftare by afking for the fite of the friars preachers. P. 22, r. Society of Antiquaries. The Eaft part of the chancel cannot have been formerly the choir of the church, as Mr. Siecle remarks, untefs he means tince the diffolution; for it was obferved the old choir was then pulled down. 46 We thould be glad to fee the authority for faying. fo distinguished was the favour of Henry I. that even murder, that blacket deepest crime of which man can be guilty, might be committed by the profeted [the inouks of Dunftable with impunity." (p. 21.) met with This privilege we never granted to any religious houles, though they could protect murderers who fought refuge. Such errors are too grois to be propagated in compilations roat pretend to the merit of the newe and doolt correct information; and it is from a with to preferve this as pure as may be, that the prefent ftrictures are ns early offered to the editors, who fhould not confider affectation of wit and of fuperficial acquaintance with their fubject as new and gemine information, and concealing the authorities whence they derive it, as in the ap pearance of a cro's in the air, 1189, from Hemingford's Chronicle, p. 519. The religious fpirit with which this compilation is made one is furry to ef timate from the following palage; One, execution at Dunliable, tendered fingula by the oft horrid difplay of cruelty, vil ever femain an indelible brand or the reign of the jeventh Henry, in whole days it was tranfacted. Dr. Smyth, the infamous bithop of Lincoln, ordered the onfortunate William Til:etworth to be burnt for denying the pope's fupremacy. But the infliction of corporeal pain was infitsient to gratify the malignant and ficl-like feelings of ecclefiafiteal ver geance. The greateft poflible degree of niental anguifh mult alfo be fuperadded to the agonized fenfations produced by the action of confuming Bames. The infernals in human fhape could only be faisted by obliging the fear-firuck dauginer of their miterable victim to fet fire to the ile defined to end the life of the ewed author of her being! Curfes pierce not: but if the tooth of the never-dying worm be eng loyed by eternal justice in the pin fhment of guilty deeds, the perpetrators of fuch an atrocious act, we may be affured, will have their reward" (p. 28.) Not to inht that not Dunflable, but Amersham, was the fcene of this execution, Fox himself, who relates it and a few more inftances of fimilar perfecution under Bp. Smyth, and whofe zeal against Popery would not futter him to be more tender than the truth compelled him to be, even to the founder of the college where he received his education, favs, however, of Smyth, ed. although he was 1596, p. 750; that, " fomewhat, eger and tharpe against the poore faple Bocke of Chritte's fervants, yet he was nothing fo bloudy and cruell as Longland, which afterward fucceeded in that dioces. For fo I finde of great abhim, that, in the time of the juratiou, divers he fent quietly, without punishment and pennance, bidding. them go home, and live as good Chrif tian men thould do." The fentence of the court was executed by the theriff'; and if he exceeded that fentence in feverity, or any other mode, the guilt at attach to him. Churton's Life of Theftrong Smyth, p. 137-140. terms, therefore, applied by our compilers here, like the "debasing spirit of Calvinifi" (p. 16), must be confidered as fo many affectations of fashionable characteristic writing, to fay nothing of the Spirit which may infire thear. The The lines copied (p. 81) from a MS. in the British Mufeum, not pointed out, feem to put it out of doubt, that the monument in Luton church did not belong to lord Wenlock, bút to John le Wenlock, knt. How the portico of the manfion at Luton Hoo can be called "a very beautiful fpecimen of that kind of architecture called the florid Gothic * let thofe judge who can confult Mr. Sandby's view of it in the Virtuofi's Mufeum, pl. IV. who refers it to fome abbot of St. Alban's before the diffolution. The crofs at Leighton Buzzard (p. 86) was erected, like many others, in the centre of the market; but whether the conformity of its grotefque ornaments with thofe in the parifh-church is any proof that the two ftructures are coaval, muft be left to better judges. P. 37, r. Lygeanbung. sit Preceding topographers have been mifled to place the fullers-earth pits at Wandon, near Woburn, in BedfordShire, though really in BuckinghamShire, from the old, and now wornoat pit at Afpley being in the former Under Woburn abbey is a good account of the portraits and other paintings; the account of thofe of the Ruffel family lately published in the European Magazine, being the only lift we recollect to have feen. It will intereft you, Mr. Urban, to be told that the Lanti vafe, which you engraved vol. LXX. p. 817, is placed in the green-houfe. For Maudlin, p. 66, r. Malden; and for Hotley (p. 71) r. Hatley. It would have been more to the purpofe to have given Dr. Caftell's epitaph than this quaint remark: "Thus perifh the fons of fcience. Even the acquirement of knowledge, when purfued beyond the bounds of prudence, is as detrimental to human exiftence as the irrational conduct of the drunkard and the profligate." Was 79† then too fhort a term for the accomplishment of his great defigns, on which he lavished fo much time and money? Infamous is fo familiar an epithet This is borrowed from the account of Luton in the Bibl. Top. Brit. No. VII. P. 54*, and the words "in brick" omitted. + 68 on his tomb is the year of his life when be put it up, not of his death. It is extraordinary no tranfcriber has given a verfion of the Arabic line on it. GENT. MAG. April, 1801. with the compiler for any object of his diflike, that he beftows it on the mi niftry that caufed Admiral Byng to be made a public example of. (p. 72.) In Northill church fome fpecimens of John Oliver's painting on glass, 1664. (p. 71-73). I always understood the late Mr. Whitbread demolished Warden abbey (p. 74); which, when I faw it 30 years ago, was a good large farm-houfe; nor did I ever hear Mr. W. was partial to Antiquities. P. 79, 1. 11, r. the cartulary of Ca nons Afhby. The account of this county concludes with "mifcellaneous;" from which we learn that the fatis tinctoria, or Woad, is no longer to be found in this county, where it was formerly univerfally cultivated, on the authority of the Rev. Tho. Orlebar Marsh, vicar of Stevington, near Bedford, and F.L.S. "who has been long employed in making collections for a natural hiftory of the county, and is daily adding to his ftock of information. Where diligent fearch is united with accurate inveftigation, a work as nearly perfect as hu man vifdom will admit is the affured refult." D. H. Mr. URBAN, Coventry, April 10. THE quotation from Hearne, p. 204, agrees with the Town-book; and, as the mayoralty commences in No vember, William Smallwood, draper," called by Dr. Thomas " mayor in 1566," is the fame perfon noted by Hearne in 1567; but the circumstance of the Queen of Scots being confined "in the mayoreffes parlour" is proba bly placed one year too early. It ap pears by concurring hiftories, that the firft landed at Wokington, in Cumberland, May 17, 1568; was thence removed to Carlifle, then to Bolton caftle, and again to Tutbury, in which latter route the paffed through Coventry. It may be new to your readers that the queen was a fecond time a prifoner in this city; as the following unpub lifhed extract from the Town-book will demonftrate: "1569, Richard Hawden, mayor.In his year was a great rebellion in the North, on which account Mary Queen of Scots was removed from Tutbury to Coventry, and there kept prifoner in the cuf tody of the Earl of Shrewsbury and Earl of Huntingdon, from St. Andrew's tide antil Candlemas, during which time the citizens |