138 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO J 771. 



in Derbyshire, and being in that neighbourhood, he was inclined to make some 

 inquiries about that noted place, of the adjoining inhabitants ; who informed him 

 that about 14 or 15 years before, the owner of the pasture in which this chasm 

 is situated, having lost several cattle, had agreed with 1 men to fill it up ; but 

 finding no visible effects of their labour, after having spent some days in throwing 

 down many loads of stones, they ventured to be let down into it, to see if their 

 undertaking was practicable ; when, on finding at the bottom a vast large cavern, 

 they desisied from their work, as it would have been almost impossible to have 



' Besides several essays, of different kinds, in the collections of the Royal and Antiquarian 

 Societies, Mr. King was also author of numerous other publications, on various subjects. 



His first publication was, " An Essay on the English Constitution and Government," 8vo. 1767. 

 In 1773 he published " A letter addressed to Dr. Hawkesworth, and humbly recommended to the 

 perusal of the very learned Deists." 



His next publication was. Observations on Ancient Castles, 1777 and J783. In 1780 he pub- 

 lished. Hymns to the Supreme Being; but without his name, which on this occasion he affected 

 to conceal, but was the first to betray his own secret. In 1788 he produced a 4to volume, entitled 

 " Morsels of Criticism ; tending to illustrate some few passages in the Holy Scriptures on philo- 

 lophical principles, and an enlarged view of things." Here it seems Mr. K. seriously amused 

 himself with some almanac prognostications ; also proofs that John the Baptist was an angel from 

 Heaven, and the same who formerly appeared in the person of Elijah ; that there will be a second 

 appearance of Jesus Christ upon earth ; that this globe is a kind of comet, which is continually 

 tending towards the sun, and will at length approach so near as to be ignited by the solar rays or the 

 elementary fluid of fire; and that the place of punishment allotted for wicked men, is the centre 

 of the earth, which is the bottomless pit, &c. In 1784 be circulated, without his name, " Proposals 

 for establishing at sea a Marine School, or Seminary for Seamen, as a means for improving 

 the Marine Society, and of clearing the streets of the inetropolis from vagabond youth, &c." 

 The proposal was to fit up a man of war as a marine school. In 1793 he published 

 " Considerations on the Utility of the National Debt, and on the present Alarming Crisis, &c." 

 His chief remaining publications were, " Vestiges of Oxford Castle ; or a small fragment of a 

 work intended to be published speedily on the History of Antient Castles, and on the Progress of 

 Architecture," 1796'. And the same year, " Remarks concerning Stones, said to have fallen from 

 the Clouds, both in these days and in Antient Times." The former of these merged in a large 

 History of Antient Castles and the Progress of Architecture, entided " Munimenta Antiqua", 

 divided into British or Druidical Roman, British in imitation of Foreign Nations, and Saxon ; of 

 which the first volume came out in 1799. the 2d in 1802, and tlie 3d in 1804. Mr. Dutens holding 

 a different opinion from Mr. K. about the antiquity of arciies, the latter replied by an anticipation 

 of part of his 4th volume. Mr. D. defended himself in a Supplement to his " Recherches sur leg 

 Voutes," &c. in 1795 ; and thus the dispute was arrested by Mr. King's death. In 1801 came out 

 a 2d volume of the " Morsels of Criticism," and in 1798, " Remarks on the Signs of the Times j" 

 in which, among other peculiarities, Mr. K. asserts the genuineness of the apocryphal 2d book of 

 Esdras; also a Supplement to the same Remarks ill 1799- But concerning these, Mr. K. met 

 with a powerful antagonist in the late learned Bishop Horsley, in his " Critical Disquisitions on 

 Isaiah xviii, in a letter to Mr. King. Many other particulars of this gentleman may be seen in 

 the Gent. Magazine, vol. 77, p. 388; and in the Mon. Magazine, vol. 23, p. ifi&." 



