14. If the Head-Master takes Pupils, what is the annual charge for the Board and Education of each Boy? 15. If the second, or other Masters take Pupils, what are their annual charges for Board and Education? 16. Are there any Church Preferments, or other advantages, belong ing to this School? 17. A list of the eminent Men who bave been educated here. 18. A drawing or impression of the common seal. Any other matters, which you may be pleased to communicate, will be gratefully received. Mr. URBAN, Exeter, Jan. 4. W THILE many other periodical publications are marked by the violence of Party-feeling, and disseminate principles of a dangerous tendency, disguised under the specious mask of Reform, your valuable pages, without shuaning candid and liberal discussion, uniformly support the true and rational theory of our glorious Constitution. I have constantly watched the conduct of intemperate Reformists, and have invariably ascertained them to be equally devoid of true patriotism and moral feeling. I have found them to be men (with few exceptions) not over abounding with either probity or property; who, having nothing to lose, and every thing to gain, by innovation and change, are ready to go any lengths within the bounds of peronal safety, to effect their nefarious objects. They are, in general, men of mediocrity of talent, who run from place to place, delivering got-by-heart and inflammatory speeches, couched in a jargon of disjointed and unconnected language, calculated only to mislead the weak and vicious. They resemble the hoary miscreant in the Vicar of Wakefield, who, to delude the unwary whom he means to plunder, repeats a prepared dissertation On the Cosmography of the World. There is another description of Reformists of a very different character: they are men of rauk, talents, and property, who court notoriety by erroneous means. They are the more dangerous, because their positions carry an appearance of candour and moderation. They quote even the authority of the immortal son of Chatham (who on sound grounds af terwards altered his early opinions), and urge, that without Reform, there is no safety against a bad, while a good Minister cannot benefit his country. The unprincipled Reformers propose what would keep the country in an uninterrupted state of riot and intoxication, that is, the wild chimera of universal suffrage, and Annual Parliaments; while the apparcutly moderate Reformers would, if they can be credited, be contented with Triennial Parliaments, and the conferring of the Elective Franchise on certain Householders and Copyholders. I, Mr. Urban, have long studied this subject, and see danger in entertaining it under any modification. It is better to bear "the ills we have, than fly to others we know not of." The country must be governed by a responsible Ministry, who must conduct public business by means of majorities. Even supposing, for argument's sake, a House of Commons (and a most delectable House it would be!) elected according to any of the plans of our Visionary Reformers, while human nature remains constituted as it is, it would soon divide itself into a majority and minority, leaving the process of public affairs to be managed as usual. The soundest theory is fallacious, in supposing the nature of man more perfect than it is, or can be on this side of time. We are perpetually stunned with in vectives against secret influence and rotten boroughs. The multitude, unable to judge for themselves, repeat the words of their Idol, without annexing to them any definite or rational meaning. Why, Mr. Urban, without these very boroughs the Landed Interest would promote their own views, to the prejudice of the Fundholder, the Merchant, and Manufacturer. Whoever looks back to the History of the Country, will find that the Representatives of these boroughs have, in general, furnished the ablest and most independent Members of Parliament. It is very true that a few of them, where there may be only some half dozen electors, are ridiculous, and no doubt will be done away, at no distant period, by a Legislative Act; bat this, in no material degree, nilitates against the evident utility of the system, as it now operales. I de I deprecate every idea of Reform, and more especially of all Reform dictated from without. If at any time forced on us, it must be the deliberate act of the Legislature at large. Mr. Burke has said, that what is granted graciously is received as a boon; and that what is extorted leads only to unqualified demands. The duration has been repeatedly altered; and whether it be five or seven years, cannot be injurious to the interests of the Nation. A few Members, more or less, never can disturb the equilibrium of the system; and men of the most moderate way of thinking allow that large towns unrepresented should have Members assigned them. Beyond this, the sound sense of the Nation will never suffer any change; and even this much might probably be better dispensed with. The view I have taken of a subject, become unavoidably prominent, is such as, I think, every well-wisher of his country must coincide with me in. By giving publicity to sober slatements, much evil is always prevented. At all events, it is an improper period for listening to projects of Reform, when the pressure of unavoidable evil occupies the well-disposed, in alleviating it, by the exertions of active benevolence. Similar distress has always attended protracted warfare; and the return of peace has uniformly turned, after a time, the course of commerce and prosperity into their wonted channels. Let the Landholder bear in mind, that he has paid his taxes by more than doubling rents, which must, necessarily, be reduced, by his own good sense, to a just and equitable standard. Let the Manufacturer, Merchant, and Shopkeeper recollect, that constant advances made on produce and prices, enabled them to pay their taxes. Let the Fundholder, and all who had no means of increasing their incomes, exultingly reflect, that they, principally, bore the burden of the day, during 23 years of unprecedented warfare, which prevented EngJand from becoming the province of France. The Public Debt was incurred for the protection of the Land, and of every description of Property. The Land, and Property in general, are, therefore, component parts of the Public Funds, which never can be touched, without the dereliction of LATENT ANTIQUITIES, NO IV. appears to is been quite exhausted; but Church Antiquities. HIS is a subject which there are some parts which have hitherto, according to the knowledge of the Writer of this Essay, been unexplained. Niches. There is good reason to think that Niches were intended to be the substitutes or representatives of Temples, whatever may have been their subsequent perversion to the statues as Kings, Nobles, and other Laymen. of persons unconnected with religion, Passing by the Niches at Palmyra, the Temple at Rome, falsely ascribed to Janus, and the Baths of Dioclesian, of Divinities, placed in Niches, which we often see upon gems small Statues they called Sacella, or Tentoría. (Priap. Carm. 13, 49. Encycl. des Antiq. v. Niches.) The usual definition and application of the Tholus in some Herculanean Paintings, confirms the idea that the Niche with its canopy implies a small Temple; for it appears to have been of similar use. By the word Edicula the Romans meant a small Temple, and sometimes the Niche in which the Statue was placed, because its interior decorations gave it the appearance of an Edes, or small Temple. Churches. Art. Celestins, tom i. pl. ii, Tombs Tombs with Figures lying under a low Niche in the Wall. In some of the chambers of Houses remaining at Herculaneum, and the antient Tuscu lum, occurs this very low Niche in which the bed was placed. Winckelman mentions another Chamber else where, in which was a place worked in the bottom of the wall for the bed. In Lye we find the Anglo-Saxon word bed-cofe for bed-chamber, probably so called because in a recess; and in many antient rooms alcoves are still remaining. At the same time the existence of bedsteads with wooden canopies, &c. is not to be denied; and an assimilation to these may be found in the form of Shrines, with testers and rich ornaments. Under the figures a mattrass is often represented. The intention of the above is to shew that the tombs alluded to refer to one antient method of sleeping and it is further probable, that the praying attitude of the hands, or crusading posture of the legs, were directions before death to the deceased, immediately after receiving the Eucharist, that he might die in that position. It is certain that to die sitting was deemed an essential military characteristic among our earlier ancestors*; and from the example of Cæsar, it appears to have been a more antient practice to consult attitudes and proprieties, even in the last moments of existence. These remarks do not affect Mr. Gough's appropriation of this kind of tombs. The hand upon the sword bears a manifest allusion to crusades, as having fought for the Church; perhaps it actually proves having engaged in such an expedition, not having merely vowed it. Still there is no science, only hypothesis, in conjectures of this kind, which may be subject to exceptions, which invalidate them. There is nothing modern in Churches except the Tower. The barn-like form, the semi-circular East end, the ailes, the chapels, and even cross projections, answering to transepts, are to be seen in plates of Antient Temples, and the Plans of Soria. The lighter style of the Gothic Architecture, as superseding the heavy preceding manner, seems to be of Asiatic origin, for it does not harmonise with the cumbrous magnificence of European * XV. Scriptores, 281. taste in the middle ages. Nothing was light and airy besides this style; and down to the Reformation the Church was an actual Heathen Temple. Rosinus and Godwin say, that the Romans had certain walks on each side of the body of the Church, which they called Porticus; and in these places it was lawful for them to make bargains, merchandize, or confer of any worldly business, as likewise in the Basilica or body itself. But their Quire, called Chorus, was set apart only for Divine Service. It is not generally known that the body of the Church, or Nave, was the Exchange of the parish. As to the Tombs in which Figures kneel before desks, it is not generally known that it was the antient method of saying the Litany between the Porch and the Altar, of which there is a good print in Sparrow's Rationale of the Common Prayer, as a Frontispiece. The Clergyman there kneels before a light moveable desk at the chancel end of the Nave, and the people in rows behind him. There are no pews; and from hence may it not be presumed, that before pews were universal, persons of rank at least had moveable reading-desks placed before them. Such desks still occur to hold the Homilies, Jewel's Apology, and similar Works, directed by authority to be placed in Churches; and it is plain from the above Print, that there was then no universal fashion of pews, even in the middle of the 17th century. The Decoration of the roofs of Churches with azure and stars of gold is of Egyptian origin. (See Rennel's Geography of Herodotus from Diod. i. c. 4.) The Arched Roof bears an allusion to the Celestial Hemisphere, The Groins, as well as circumstances would permit, imitating the artificial circles in the spheres of the day; and upon this idea of representing Heaven, Angels at the intersections of the groins are playing upon various musical instruments in the Choir at Gloucester: the roof of the Choir only was often thus distinguished, the Nave not being vaulted at all. The Chancel of the very curious Anglo-Saxon Church of Kilpeck in Herefordshire, is a solid Quadrant, or fourth part of a Sphere, entered by an arch, up the pilasters of which stand four of the Apostles: it is purposely contrived to present a fine coup d'œil from the West West end. It is no new idea, that the Chancel or Choir was intended to represent Heaven; but the physical mode of exciting that idea by conformation (the apparent intention of semi-circular East ends, according to this of Kilpeck) was not so glaring in subsequent Chancels: but this was a consequence of the introduction of another style of Architecture. Supposing the Nave to mean mystically this world, the ascent to the Choir is founded upon the Resurrection; but mystically only, for such an ascent to the Adytum is frequent in Heathen Temples. The gates in them were also in the West end (with some exceptions), that, as Vitruvius says, the Worshippers might look towards the East. Many of these remarks are requested to be received as uncertain, but intended to elicit superior information. Buildings upon Coins. In the Atti della Academia Italiana, tome i. Florence, 1808, is a Memoir of Giuseppe del Rosso, in which he overthrows a prevailing opinion concerning Buildings upon Coins, namely, that they are fac-similes, or nearly so, of existing fabricks. The Author shews, by various examples, that the antient Monuments of Architecture seen upon Coins, are not for the most part faithful copies of originals; so that we cannot refer to the Coins for acquiring the real form of Buildings once eminent, but wholly destroyed. There are, however (he says), some Coins which make us acquainted with singular constructions and usages peculiar to the Romans in the art of Building. They are given with much fidelity; and in this view the study of Coins is always useful to Architects. Celtic Funerals. The following are collections from Ossian upon this subject; and in some particulars they are evidently confirmed by the researches made in Barrows. Warnings. "From the tree at the grave of the dead the long howling owl is heard. I see a dim form on the plain, it is a ghost, it fades, it flies. Some funeral shall pass this way; the meteor marks the path." (Note on Croma.)- Here is the Corpse Candle of Wales. Macpherson (note on Temora, B. iv.) says, "It was thought that the ghosts of deceased Bards sung for three nights preceding the death (near the place where his tomb was to be be raised), round an unsubstantial figure, which represented the body of the person who was to die. Funeral Rites. The antient Scots, says Macpherson, opened a grave six or eight feet deep: the bottom was lined with fine clay, and on this they laid the body of the deceased; and, if a warrior, his sword, and the heads of twelve arrows by his side. Above they laid another stratum of clay, in which they placed the horn of a deer, the symbol of hunting. The whole was covered with a fine mould, and four stones placed an end to mark the extent of the grave. Note on Fingal, B. i. "Four stones (says the Poem) rise on the grave of Cathba." In Fingal (b. iv.) we have," But remember, my son, to place this sword, this bow, the horn of my deer, within that dark and uarrow house, whose mark is one grey stone.” The four stones placed on an end are the Kistvaen so common in British Barrows. The strata, horns, sword, &c. occur. The Barrow was made by some favourite maid or youth. "If fall I must in the field, raise high my grave, Vinvela. Grey stones and heaped up earth shall mark me to future times. When the hunter shall sit by the mound and produce his food at noon, ་ some warrior rests here,' he will say; and my fame shall live in his praise." (Carricthura). It is raised by the favourite lover in Oithona. They were assisted by the Bards. The scite of interment was denoted by a tree or two stones. "A tree stands alone on the hill, and marks the slumbering Connal. The leaves whirl round with the wind, and shew the grave of the dead." (Carricthura.) "Two stones half sunk in the ground, shew their heads of moss." (Carthon.) If the tomb was beside a fen, and no song sung over the grave, it was deemed disgraceful. "Beside some fen shall a tomb be seen: it shall rise without a song." (Temora, b. 5.) It is certain that Barrowsare mostly upon high grounds. At the time of burial a funeral elegy was sung by the Bard, and every stanza closed with some remarkable title of the hero. (Death of Cuthullin, and Macpherson's Note.), And the Bards, when they came to the e grave of an |