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MR. URBAN,-In your Obituary (Dec. p. 660) of this month there is a mistake as to the father of Samuel Beazley, the late architect and dramatist; Samuel Beaz. ley was not the son but the nephew of Charles. His father's name was, to the best of my recollection, Samuel, and he was an army accoutrement maker. His private house was in Parliament-street, and there Samuel was born, I think three or four years earlier than your article states.

Mr. Charles Beazley was an architect, not a surveyor as stated. Among his works was a church at Faversham, with a spire standing on diagonal arches, like in principle to that at Newcastle, and that of St. Dunstan's in the East. He was, I think, a pupil of the talented Sir Robert Taylor. Yours, &c. Jos. GWILT.

The Rev. Thomas Dyer, of Abbess Roding, begs to correct a mistake in our Obituary (Dec. p. 661) respecting Mr. GEORGE STEPHENS: "He was not the author of the Vampire, a tragedy, 1821, or of Montezuma, a tragedy. Both were written by a young friend of mine, HUGO BELFOUR, who afterwards took orders as Chaplain in the West Indies, and died in the year 1827. The Poems, 1822, were their joint production. I have a copy of them, with their names attached." The Rev. Hugo John Belfour died in Jamaica in Sept. 1827, and a brief memoir of him will be found in the Gentleman's Magazine for that year, vol. xcvII. ii. 570.

Mr. W. Reader remarks, that the Church in which the inscription quoted by C. B. in our Magazine for Dec. p. 627, is to be found, is not Upton, but Ufton, about four miles from Southam; so named from Ulf, one of its possessors before the Conquest. The party's name is Woddomes, and that of one of his daughters Jone. The true meaning of the word Vossioner is, without doubt, owner of the advowson.

In our memoir of the life and works of the late WILLIAM WYON, R.A. (in Dec. p. 613,) it was stated that "Mr. Wyon's works include the recent war medals of the Peninsula, Trafalgar, Jellalabad, and Cabul;" and "that the medal for Jella. labad bears a portrait of Her Majesty with the inscription VICTORIA VINDEX," &c. We are informed by a correspondent signing "Ball-Cartridge," that the medal to which this description applies was issued for "Cabul, Candahar, and Ghuz

nee," and that the medal issued to the gallant 13th regiment (the only corps in the Queen's service who were present at Jellalabad) is of the following description. A mural crown with JELLALABAD represented, and on the reverse merely this inscription: VII APRIL 1842.

Our correspondent has inclosed an impression of this Jellalabad medal; and, with a blush as Englishmen, we must add, that as a work of art it is unworthy to be named among the works of Wyon, or any artist better than a button-maker.

MR. URBAN,-At the memorable sale of literary and artistic curiosities in 1842 at Strawberry Hill, looking through an interesting heap of MSS. among those which had been treasured up by that industrious engraver, the well-known Vertue, I lighted upon a half-anonymous morceau which appeared endorsed by himself (who may be said to have been the pivot round whom all the interests of the arts of his day centred) thus-" This writ to me from John Murray of Sacomb;" and as it relates to the immortal Chaucer, I hope you will think it worthy a corner in your "Minor Correspondence," that we may hear further of it, and somewhat more of the said Murray of Sacomb, of whom I hope there is in existence a curious and rare portrait to aid the investigation.

The Description of Geoffrey Chaucer.
His stature was not very tall,
Lean he was, and his legs were small,

Hosed within a stock of red:
A button'd bonnet on his head,
From under which did hang, I weene,
Silver hair both bright and sheene.
His band was white, trimm'd round,
His count'nance bright and merry found;
A sleeveless jacket large and wide,
With many plaights and skirtles dy'd,
Of water chamlet did he wear;
A whittle by his belt he bare ;
His shoes were carved broad before;
His inkhorn at his side he bore:
And in his hand be bore a booke:
Thus did the antient poet looke.
I admit the probability of my having
missed the precise orthography and spelling,
as I made only a hasty pencil transcript
on the corner of the catalogue, but some
correspondent may set this in order for us.
Yours &c. NICOLAS FERRET.

is nothing very tangible which can be specified respecting the young lady's earliest doings, but it is clear that she was looked upon by the friends of her father in the light of an extraordinary child. To us the little that is left as proof of her wonderful powers, would, we confess, were such now exhibited to us as the productions of a child of the year 1852, excite a good deal of apprehension of pedantry, and fail entirely to satisfy us of the originality of the little authoress; still less would it make us anticipate a feeling, susceptible heart. The wisdom of aged men, the language and ideas of heathen sages, sound but sadly from the lips of a girl of twelve years old, and a chill creeps over us as we read. But, in reality, this is but the outer view of the matter so far as Olympia is concerned, for we cannot easily over-estimate the indirect influences to which she was subjected, in her constant familiar intercourse with some men of rare goodness, as well as scholarship. It is quite plain that the teachers of this young girl were very genial and affectionate; that they early loved her as one of singular gentleness, modesty, and docility. With all the defects and absurdities of the pedantic system of education adopted in her own case, and that of several other young ladies of the court of Ferrara, thus much at least must be said, that it accustomed these women to the best kind of society to be found at that period. Their childhood, so far as childish pleasures were concerned, seems to have been a blank; but it was raising up for them some strong and noble friendships for after life. The relations of master and scholar were in those times peculiarly dear: and all that was afterwards before them, their struggles to gain liberty of thought, the calm endurance, the discipline of patience and suffering for conscience' sake, came associated with their most distinguished early remembrances.

A home circle was not however from an early period among the advantages of Olympia's childhood. She was sent for by the Duchess Renée,

when little more than twelve years of age, to be the companion of her own daughter Anne d'Este; the latter was five years younger than Olympia, but seems to have been goaded on to keep pace with her in an extraordinary manner in her studies. We hear of her reciting passages from Cicero and Demosthenes, and translating Esop's fables, when she could scarcely have reached her eighth or ninth year. Olympia, meanwhile, rejoicingly pursued her own vocation, as she and her masters had decided scholarship to be, and gloried in being set free from housewifely toils. She read Pindar and wrote Pindarics. Great things are told of her powers of ready improvisation, and of her critical acumen; and some of her friends have added to the catalogue of her acquirements a knowledge of modern tongues which certainly did not exist to the extent they have stated, for she herself, in one of her letters, entirely disclaims German.

We have not the smallest doubt however that, making every abatement on the score of that fond partiality which the master is so apt to bear to the pupil, her powers and attainments were very great. But now the harder trials of her life were in preparation. Her father, some of whose most cherished friends were by this time strongly imbued with the reforming spirit, was himself beginning to entertain similar views. Unpopular enough they were at Ferrara, for though the Duchess Renée was secretly the friend of Calvin, of Beza, and of Clement Marot, it was far otherwise with her husband. He seems uniformly to have beheld all the avowed Reformers with aversion; and the Duchess underwent much private persecution, while those in her court supposed to be of heretical opinions had little to hope for in their future.

Moreover, Pope Paul the Third, in visiting Ferrara, had intimated pretty strongly his own ideas as to the course to be adopted, and, in no long time thereafter, the establishment of a tribunal of the Inquisition was announced.*