this very subject, containing the opinion of Sir Christopher Wren respecting it. There Sir Christopher, if I remember right, extends the overflow of the tide considerably more into the land than I have done. But he attributes the embankment, as I do, to the Romans; though he has not appealed to that striking demonstration of the opinion, the British state of St. George's Fields, &c. contrasted with the Roman condition of them.

1787, Aug.

Yours, &c.

J. W.

CIX. On the Office of Aulnager.

MR. URBAN,

AULNAGER is derived from ulna and gerens, and is the name of an officer under the king, established about the year 1350, whose business it was to measure all English woollen cloths before they were brought into market, and then to affix an impression of his seal. This measure was to be the government between the buyer and seller, and to prevent all disputes about short measure. It is now obsolete. The first statute made for it is 25 Edward III. wherein it is enacted, that all cloths shall be measured by the king's aulnager; and that every buyer of cloth, after the price is agreed in the halls or markets, shall have it measured by the king's aulnager, who shall put his stamp thereon, and the piece of cloth shall stand for that length. And it was further enacted, that, to prevent the aulnager's tumbling or defoiling them when he measured them, he was to provide himself with a string of the length of seven yards, and the piece was to measure four times the length of that string, and he was to measure it at the creased edge. 27 Edward III. ordains the following fees to the aulnager: for every piece of cloth of ray (or white cloth,) 28 yards long and 6 quarters wide, one halfpenny, and no more, and every half-piece one farthing, and no more; to be paid by

the seller.

N. B. The best cloth then yielding about 2s. per yard, mounts to about 4d. per piece, on a modern superfine of 6s. per yard, 28 yards long. Many other statutes were uade on this head, viz. 17 Rich. II. 7 Hen. IV. 11 Hen.IV. 1 Hen. VI. 4 Edw. IV. 17 Edw. IV. 5 Edw. VI. and others.

In 11 Henry IV. all the aulnagers' seals were called in, and new ones were delivered out.

In the year 1437 Sir Walter Lord Hungerford, for his services at the relief of the siege of Calais, had a pension granted him*, out of the aulnage of cloth for Wiltshire, of one hundred marks per annum; by which we may judge there was a considerable quantity of cloth manufactured in Wiltshire in those early times. But I think one hundred marks, divided into halfpence, is too large a number to be probable, especially when we consider that hardly a century had passed since Edward III. brought over the Flemish artificers. However, I find, that in 27 Edw. III. besides the aulnage, parliament granted a subsidy, to maintain the French war, of 4d. per annum, to be collected also by the aulnager, 6d. if a scarlet in grain, and 5d. if bastard, or half-scarlet. If, therefore, this subsidy was continued or revived (as is very probable, we having for some time been engaged in a very expensive war with France,) the whole might very easily and naturally be called the aulnage of cloth. As therefore, there was granted a pension of 100 marks out of this fund, there were also many other expences to be provided for, the salary of the aulnager, &c. so that I think we may conclude the pension would not have been more than half the fund; which therefore would have been about 200 marks per annum. To produce which, at 44d. per piece (aulnage and subsidy,) there must have been manufactured annually in the county of Wilts seven thousand one hundred and eleven pieces of broad cloth, containing one hundred and ninety-nine thousand yards, or thereabouts 1787, Nov. P. Q

CX. On the Cities which have formerly been the Capital of

England.

Winchester, Nov. 7.

MR. URBAN, THAT London is the present metropolis of England, we presume the most ignorant of its inhabitants are informed: but how long London has enjoyed this prerogative, and what cities have preceded her in this dignity, are points which the most learned do not appear to have hitherto ascertained.

* Dugdale.

That there were cities of a certain kind previous to the Roman invasion, notwithstanding the rude and pastoral life of its inhabitants, independent of other proofs, appears from the extraction of many of their names at the present day being British instead of Latin or Saxon. The city, for example, from whence the present letter is dated, was called by the Aborigines Caer guent, or the White City, from the chalky hills that every where surround it; which proper name, in a Roman mouth, was naturally transformed into Venta, and, with the addition of the word that denoted it to be a fortified place, was pronounced of course by a Saxon, as we read it in their historians, Wintaceaster. Yet, notwithstanding we are satisfied of the existence of cities in this island before the Roman eagle waved its wings over it, the circumstantial history of the British Geoffery, concerning their ancient state and founders, though not quite so destitute of foundation as many suppose, is yet too uncertain to ground a claim of precedency in any one of them.

Had Casibellaunus been the hereditary monarch of the island, instead of the elected general amongst independent chieftains, to oppose the mighty Julius, as it appears that Verulam, to which our protomartyr Alban afterwards lent his name, was his chief city, so the same might be said to have been the capital of the island. As soon, however, as the Roman power was fully established, we have no difficulty in bestowing that title on Camalodunum, now Malden, in Essex, the first of their colonies, and the chief seat of their government, where also the tributary Cunobellinus (the Cymbeline of Shakespeare) sometimes held a precarious sway. Hence, in that generous struggle for liberty which our British Amazon Boadicea maintained against the invaders, we find that Camalodunum was the first and chief object of her vengeance, as the very centre of Roman tyranny. This brave heroine being, by the fate of war, afterwards overcome on the confines of the Belga, which spot, from other circumstances, appears to have been on the eastern borders of Hampshire, is asserted, on the faith of some ancient manuscripts, to have been buried at Venta, which, during this period, makes a considerable figure both as a place of commerce and defence. It appears that the imperial manufactory of sailcloth and of clothing was established in this city; the fortifications of it also, which are said to have been first raised by Mulmutius Dunwallo, were, about this time, put into complete repair by Guiderius, otherwise called Togodumnus, on his refusing to pay tribute to the Roman conquerors. In these fortifications, if we

may believe Matthew of Westminster, and British in opposition to Latin historians, the Emperor Claudius himself was besieged, after being defeated near Clausentum (the modern Southampton) till he was obliged to purchase peace of Arviragus on ignominious terms. During the period I am speaking of, it is agreed on all hands, that London was not fortified, and though celebrated, says Tacitus, for the resort of merchants, it was not honoured with the title of a colony.

In process of time, as the seat of war was removed to the Northern parts of the island, and while the Roman legions were chiefly stationed on the confines of the Picts, the colony of York seems to have risen to the first degree of eminence. Certain it is, that two Roman emperors, Severus and Constantius Chlorus, died there, and that the great Constantine was advanced to the dignity of emperor in that city.

If, during the turbulent and cloudy scene that succeeded the retiring of the Roman legions from Britain, till the establishment of the Heptarchy, any city was more particularly distinguished, it appears to be Winchester. Here it was that Constans, who had been a resident of the cloister of that ancient cathedral, was crowned King of Britain. Here also mention is made in history of Aurelius Ambrosius, Uther Pendragon, and of the great Arthur, having resided. The last named, it is universally asserted, built the castle of Winchester, which continued one of the chief bulwarks of the island till it was battered down by the usurper Cromwell. In this castle Arthur is said to have held his martial sports, and feasted his knights, as at his principal palace. In proof of this, a huge round table is still preserved in the ancient chapel of the castle, now the county hall, as the identical table round which his knights were placed at their feast to avoid contentions for precedency: certain it is, that it was shewn for such to the Emperor Charles V. in 1512, at which time it was, for the last time, new painted; that it was described as such by Hardinge the poet, in the reign of Edward IV. and that it was generally reputed as such in the beginning of the twelfth century. The words of John, Bishop of Ross, on this subject, are as follow: "Si accola falsa quadam nominum superstitione conflictati non errant rotundam mensam in castro Wintoniensi ad æternam magni Arturis memoriam solemniter conservatam aspexi an. 1139." Notwithstanding the sevenfold division of the kingdom by the Saxons, we still find some one of the rival princes during the Heptarchy paramount to the rest. Hence the

chief seat of government, though more frequently found at Winchester than at any other particular place, may be said to have changed to each of these petty kingdoms, as each of them in turn prevailed, except that of the East Angles, as if it had been destined that London, its principal city, should never rise to the rank of metropolis of the kingdom till she should become so once for all, and we hope for

ever.

Huic ego nec metas rerum, nec tempora pono:
Imperium sine fine dedi.

NEID.

At length, however, the kingdom of the West Saxons swallowing up the rest, Egbert, assembling a wittenagemot, or meeting of the chief persons of the kingdom, at Winchester, his principal city, caused himself to be there crowned monarch of the whole nation, and destroyed every distinction of name, as well as government, that had hitherto subsisted. At this period, perhaps for the first time, we are to look out for a city, which, uniting in itself all the several advantages of extent of building and of commerce, of being the repository of public records and revenues, and of being the chief royal residence and seat of government, can, with the strictest propriety, and without the danger of competition, be called the capital of England. Such Winchester then was, and such it continued to be till an undefined period in the reign of the Plantagenets, and for a space of time, perhaps, equal to the duration of proud London's precedency.

The present condition of this city, we are to observe, exhibits but the skeleton of what it was during the period I am speaking of; for, besides the incredible number of houses and churches crowded within its walls, its suburbs then reached a mile in every direction beyond their precincts. That it was the first city in the island for commerce, I think may be fairly deduced from the first guild, or confraternity of merchants, being established here, so early as the reign of Ethelwolph, the father of Alfred, and from the charter of immunity from toll throughout the kingdom, granted to this guild by Henry I. a participation of which privilege was not conferred on the citizens of London till the reign of Richard I. In like manner, we find in its archives the city of Winchester described as incorporated by the name of mayor and bailiffs, anno 1187, that is to say, above twenty years before London obtained a charter for the same purpose, during which time its chief magistrate