ro2 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1790. 
Tt isa Curious circumftance, that, 
if any perfon, having begun one of 
thefe public buildings, fhould die 
before the completion, nobody will 
afterwards add & fingle ftone, as it 
would not convey his name to pof- 
terity,, but that of the original 
founder. ; 
The founder of this choultry lived 
to compleat four of the largeft build- 
ings in India. This choultry, a 
pagoda, a tank three quarters of a 
mile fquare, twenty feet deep, and 
faced with ftone, anda grand palace 
ornamented with beautiful black 
granite pillars, fome of which are 
twenty feet high, cut out of one 
ftone. 
: 
—_—_——$$ or 
Of the Antiquity of the City of Lon- 
~ don; from Mr. Pennant’s Account. 
T was from the merchants who 
J frequented our ports that Cafar 
received the firft intelligence of the 
nature of ‘our ‘country, which in- 
duced him to undertake the invafion 
of Britain, and which in after-times 
Jayed the foundation of its conqueit 
by the Romans. PAD ee 
There is not the leaft reafon to 
doubt but that London exifted at 
that period, and was a place of 
much refort. It ftood'in fuch‘a 
fituation as the Britons would fele&, 
according to the rule they eftablifh- 
ed. An immenfe foreft originally 
extended to the river fide, and even 
as late as the reign of Henry IT. co- 
vered the northern neighbourhood 
of the city, and was filled with va- 
tious fpecies of beafts of chace. It 
“was defended’ naturally by ‘foffes ; 
one formed by the creek which ran 
along Fleet-ditch, the other, after- 
wards known by that of Walbrook, 
The fouth fide was guarded by the 
4M : 
Thames. The north they might 
think fufficiently proteéted by the ~ 
adjacent foreft. 
Near St. Swithin’s church is a 
remnant of antiquity, which fome 
have fuppofed to have been Britith 5 
a ftone, which might have formed 
a part of a Druidical circle; or fome 
other object of the ancient religion, 
as it is placed near the center of 
the Roman precinéts. Others have 
conjectured it to have been a milli- 
ary ftone, and to have ferved as a 
ftandard, from which they began ta 
compute their miles. This feems 
very reafonable, as the diftances 
from the neighbouring places co- 
incide very exactly. At all times 
it has .been. preferved with great 
care, was placed deep in the ground, 
and ftrongly faftened with bars of 
iron. It feems preferved like the 
Palladium of the city. It is at 
prefent cafed like a relique, within 
free-ftone, with a hole left in the 
middle, which difcovers the origi- 
nal. Certainly fuperititious refpect 
had been payed to it; for when the 
notorious rebel Jack Cade paffed by 
it, after he had forced his way into 
the city, he ftruck his fword on 
London ftone, faying, “ Now is 
Mortimer lord of this citie;’? as if 
that had been a cuftomary ceremony 
of taking poffeffion. 
» There is every reafon to fuppofe 
that the Romans poffefied them- 
felves of London in the reign of 
Claudius; under whom Aulus Plau- 
tius took Camalodunum, the prefent 
Maldon, in Effex, and*planted there 
a colony, confifting of veterans of 
the fourteenth Jegion, about a‘hun- 
dred and five years after the firit in- 
vafion of our ifland by Cefar. ‘This 
was the firft footing the Romans | 
had. in Britain. It feems ‘certain 
that London and Verulam were 
. taken 
