254 
controverly will be two hundred years 
out of my reach. Mr. Bryant I did 
find begged a vait many queftions, which 
aved to me his own doubts. Dr. 
Glynn’s foolith evidence made me laugh— 
and fo did Mr. Bryant*s femjidility for me. 
He fays Chatterton treated me very 
cruelly in one of his writings. I am (ure 
I did vot feel it fo. I fuppofe Bryant 
means under the title of Baron of Ot:anto, 
which is written with humour. I muft 
have been the fenfitive plant, if any thing 
in that chara&ter had hurt me! Mr. 
Bryant too and the Dean, as I tee by 
extracts in the papers, have decorated 
Chatterton with 
Think of that young rafcal’s note, oy 
fumming up his gains and loffes by 
writing for and againft Beckford, he lays, 
«cam glad he is dead, by 31. 135. 6d.” 
There was a lad of too nice honour to 
be guilty of a forgery !—and a lad, who 
they do not deny, forged the poems in 
the ftyle of Offian and fifty other things. 
¥n the parts I did read, Mr. Bryant as 
I expeGied, reafons admirably, and ttag- 
geed me; but when I took up the 
oems called Rowley’s again, I protelt 
pens: fee the fmalleft air of any anti- 
quity, but the old words. The whole 
texture is conceived on ideas of the pre- 
fent century. The liberal manner of 
thinking of a monk fo long before the 
reformation is as ftupendous—and where 
he met with Ovids Metamorpholis, Eclo- 
gues, and plans of Greck Tragedies, 
when even Caxton, a printer,\ took Vir- 
gil’s ABneid for fo rare a novelty, are 
not }efs incomprehenfible—though thele 
things I {peak at random, nor have 
fearched for the zra when the Greek and 
Latin Claffics came again to light—at 
prefent, I imagine, long, after our Ed- 
ward IV. 
Another thing ftrack me in my very 
curfory perufal of Bryant. He aiks 
where Chatterton covid find fo much 
knowledge of Englith events? I could 
te!l him where be might, by a very natu- 
yal hypothefis, though merely an hypo- 
thefis, It appears by the evidence that 
Canning left fix chefts of MSS. and that 
Chatterton got poffeflion of fome, or fe- 
veral. Now what was there in fo probably 
as a diary drawn up by Canning him- 
felf, or fome church warden, or wardens, 
ar by a monk or monks? Is any thing 
more ntural than for fuch a perfor, 
amidft the events of Briftol, to fer down 
fuch other public faés «as happened in 
the refi of the kingdom? Was not fuch 
Coliana. 
fanctimonious honour, 
[ April 1,- 
almoft all the materials of our ancient 
ftory? There is aétually fuch an one, 
with fome curious collateral faéts, if I 
ain not miitaken, for I write by memory, 
in the Hiftory of Furneie or Fountaines” 
Abbey. I forget which. If Chatterton 
found fuch an one, did he want the ex- 
tenfive literature on which fo much ftrefs 
is laid? Hypothefis tor hypothefis, I am 
fure this is-as rational an one, as the 
fuppofition that fix cheits were filled wiih 
poems never elfe heard of. 
Thele are my indigetted thoughts on 
this matter—not that I ever intend to 
digeft them—for I will not, at fixty-four, 
fail back into the fourteenth and fifteenth 
centuries, and be drowned in an ocean 
of monkifh writers of thofe ages, or of 
this ! Your’s moft fiacerely, 
| H. WaLPOLE.” 
FOTHERINGAY CASTLE. 
There is now no rcmains of the 
Caltle of Fotheringay, except the artifi- 
cial hill on which troud the Keep, which 
is now covered with grafs, and a few out. 
buildings which make a_ farm-houfe;: 
and no remembrance er tradition where 
the Hall iteod, in which the unfortunate 
Mary Queen of Scots was beheaded. it 
was furrounded by a mote, now a dry 
ditch. Very “ear it ftands the gate-houle 
of an old building, now conveited into 
farm-barns and offices, on the other fide 
of the ftreet, at the corner. On the gate~ 
houfe arch are thefé arms which looks as 
if ic was the remains of the Palace of , 
the Dukes of York, viz. Leon and Caftile 
quarterly, and on the other fide of the 
arch, Mortimer and Burgh quarterly; 
above the arch are the Arms of France 
and England, quarterly, held by an Angel ; 
and on the other fide the fame, ‘quarterly 
Neville. 
Edward of Langley, Earl of Cam- 
bridge and Duke ot York, sth fon of 
King Edward” JIf. had to his 1 wife 
Ifabella, 2d daughter, and one of the 
heirs of Peter King of Cattile and Leon; 
by whom he had Edward Piantagener, 
Duke of York, who was flain at the 
battle of Agincourt, 1415, 25th O&tober ; 
and was buried at Fotheringay, December 
ift, following. Richard Plantagenet, Duke 
of York, aiter the death of his uncle, 
Edward beforefaid, was flain in the battle 
of Wakeficid, 1460, and, being fir bu- 
ried at Pomiret, was afterwards removed 
to the church of Fotheringay. He mar- 
ried Cecilia, daughter of Raiph Neville, 
Earl of Wefton, which accounts for two 
of thefe bearings, 
ORIGINAL 
Se a ee 
SS SO. a 
