U^nry III. to the End of Henry VI. 6 1 



letter of Regina, he has drawn more like to 

 a B than an R. On the abbefs's girdle is 

 Vel ave — as little to be decyphered as her 

 majelly's Vol. 



But it is to Sir William Dugdale that I 

 am indebted for the greateft difcoveries I 

 have made towards the hiftory of our an- 

 cient artiils. In that colle6lion of various 

 treafures which he has faved from oblivion 

 [faved the more luckily, as he wrote buc 

 the inllant before it became piety to commie 

 devaftation] He has incidentally preferved 

 fome memorials of the ftate of painting 

 in the reigns of our earliefl princes. I have 

 found fome names of the profeflbrs, and 

 even the rates of their work. I call 

 them profefTors, agreeably to modern efti- 

 mation, but our anceflors feem to have 

 treated them without any diilindlion from 

 other mechanics. If Henry III. befpokc 

 pi6lures by the intervention of the fheriff", 

 under Henry VI. we were flill fo unpo- 

 lifhed, that a peer of the firft nobility go- 

 ing into France on an embalTy, contradled 

 with his taylor for the painter*s work that 

 was to be difplayed in the pageantry of his 



journey. 



