Monthly Review of Liierature, 



[Dfcc. 



may have become one, as the writer sug- 

 gests or perhaps the three. A chapel of 

 the place was destroyed by the monks of 

 Melsa, for which atonement was made to 

 the amount of 100 marks, in the reign of 

 John. 



Bnt the importance of Hull, both as a 

 town and a place of trade, is testified by 

 a petition, fifteen years before Edward's 

 purchase, from the abbot of Meaux, pray- 

 ing that he and his successors might have 

 a market on Thursdays, at Wyke, near 

 Mitten upon the Huile, and a fair there 

 in each year, on the Vigil, the day and the 

 morrow of the Holy Trinity, and on the 

 Iwelve following days. The annual value 

 again of the property of the monks in the 

 Hulle, which was made over to the king, 

 being as high as 78 14s. 6^d., shews its 

 importance and they not the sole proprie- 

 torsthe canons of Watton Abbey, arch- 

 bishop of York, and the family of Sutton, 

 and others, were also proprietors. But to 

 take the more direct testimonies. Tn 1198, 

 Gervasius de Aldermannesberie accounted 

 to the exchequer for 225 marks for 45 

 sacks of wool taken and sold there ; hence 

 it may be inferred, that not only was it a 

 seaport, but also one of the chosen places 

 from which the great native commodity of 

 wool was allowed to be exported. In 1205, 

 in the pipe-roll, there is a charge in the 

 sheriff's accounts, made under the autho- 

 rity of the king's writ, of 14s. lid. for 

 expenses of carrying the king's wines 

 from Hull to York that is, wines brought 

 into that port. But comparison is here 

 perhaps the best criterion. A document 

 exists the compotus of Win. de Wrote- 

 ham and his companions which shews 

 that at the commencement of the 13th 

 century, it was not only superior to York 

 in the extent of its commerce, but actually 

 exceeded all the ports in the kingdom in 

 mercantile wealth and substance except 

 London, Boston, Southampton, Lincoln, 

 and Lynn. According to that document, 

 the receipts at the customs was, in Lon- 

 don, 837., and at Hull, 334., while at 

 Yorke they were only 175. On an 

 average, also, of four years before Ed- 

 ward's purchase, the duties received at 

 Hull amounted to nearly one-seventh of 

 the aggregate through the whole king- 

 dom. 



These and numerous other facts and al- 

 lusions establish the certainty of the im- 

 portance of Hull as a place of trade, and 

 a principal port, long before the period 

 usually assigned namely, the date of 

 Edward's exchange with the monks of 

 Melsa, and the subsequent patronage of 

 Michael de la Poolc a townsman of 

 Hull. 



Practical Instructions for Landscape 

 Painting. Mr. John Clark, the ingenious 

 inventor of the My riorama, the Portable 



Diorama, and several other highly curious 

 and interesting scientific toys, has pro- 

 duced a new book, entitled Practical In- 

 structions for Landscape Painting y the 

 object of which is, to supersede the ne- 

 cessity, in acquiring the art of drawing, 

 of employing a master. The work, which 

 is divided into four parts, and embellished 

 with fifty-five coloured quarto engrav- 

 ings, explains the whole principle, and 

 illustrates the practice, of landscape paint- 

 ing, from the more limited sketch, to the 

 most highly finished subject j and this in 

 a manner, although simple, so complete 

 as to detail, that every separate gradation 

 of the task is perceptible to the learner. 

 The book is very splendidly got up ; the 

 engravings (many of which possess con- 

 siderable merit), being separately mounted 

 on card-board, and inclosed in cases, in 

 imitation of coloured drawings. And, al- 

 together, it is only justice to observe, that 

 it proves at once an extremely useful work 

 of instruction, and a very elegant circum- 

 stance of embellishment to the library, or 

 drawing-room table. 



A Treatise on the New Method of Land- 

 surveying^ with the improved Plan of Keep- 

 ing the field Book, by Thomas Hornby* 

 London : Baldwin ; 1827. A merely su- 

 perficial acquaintance with the theoretical 

 elements of any branch of knowledge, 

 seems to be considered, at the present 

 day, sufficient to entitle the possessor to 

 write upon the subject, and to rank among 

 its most luminous expounders, provided 

 his ignorance either be veiled in felicity 

 of diction, or accompanied by extravagant 

 pretension. We have loquacious barris- 

 ters mystifying the public on philosophy, 

 the vocabulary of which they had acquired 

 in youth, and amateurs of science, still 

 green from their colleges, dogmatizing to 

 experienced men on the construction and 

 use of apparatus, of which they are 

 scarcely familiar with the appearance, or 

 conversant with the application. Of the 

 degree of useful knowledge likely to be 

 diffused by these means, any rational man, 

 may easily judge j and the result, we can 

 assure him, has fully justified the expec- 

 tation. But while the public has thus 

 been trifled with by individuals, who, by 

 their severity to others, have forfeited ail 

 claim to mercy for themselves, several 

 practical works have appeared from the 

 pens of men whose reputation entitles 

 them to confidence, and whose professional 

 character is a pledge of ability to com- 

 municate information in the line of their 

 business: in this class the present volume 

 is to be ranked comprising within itself 

 all that the experience of a long life has 

 shown to be requisite to complete the 

 education of a surveyor in the most ex- 

 tended sense of the term, or to facilitate 

 his subsequent operations, expressed in a 



