a work compiled on so excellent a plan, that it is to be wished some spirited Publisher would bring it a sincere honest man and a good Christian. to benefit mankind, and relieve the poor. died the 15th of September, 1761, sged 62 years." The result of a strict enquiry after his "History of Sheriffs" was, that it is supposed to have been destroyed, with many other of his papers, by an illiterate brother, who is himself since dead. He wrote a most singular hand; and crowded his lines so close together, that they entangled in one another in a way that made it extremely difficult to read his letters. The late Mr. Cole of Milton held a correspondence with him for some time. The "History of the Gentlemen's Society at Spalding" has afforded the greater part of the above particulars; to which I may add, that I have in my own possession the most unequivocal proofs of Mr. Smyth's astonishing application. Carter's "History of the University of Cambridge" I have now before me, interleaved, so completely filled by the MS additions of Mr. Smyth, that the overflowings make a considerable figure in the margin of a second copy. Walker's "Sufferings of the Clergy," Le Neve's "Fasti Anglicani," and Wotton's "Baronetage, 1741," are all in like manner enriched with corrections and copious additions. Mr. Smyth was an early member also, and secretary, of a Society formed in 1730 at Peterborough "for the promotion of friendship and literature," of which Mr. Neve was treasurer. This institution, corresponding to that at Spalding, still continues; and their library shews many marks of Mr. Smyth's attentive industry; many of the books there being improved by his judicious observations in the margin. Among these I particuarly noticed (and borrowed) a copy of Burton's Leicestershire, in which many of the pedigrees are much corrected. His topographical researches seem to have naturally commenced in Cambridgeshire, where he received his education; to have advanced in Huntingdonshire, the county in which he was preferred; and to have extended thence to a considerable circle. In 1786, when this note was first written, I possessed the following indubitable proofs of his consummate industry: 1. A volume of Collections for Huntingdonshire, evidently finished for the press; in which the sheriffs of Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire are accurately collected on his own improved plan. 2. A folio volume, in which the epitaphs in Huntingdonshire and Bedfordshire are fairly transcribed. 3. Another, with those of the county of Rutland. 4. A large collection for the counties of Cambridge, Huntingdon, and Lincoln; with some few for the counties of Leicester and Nottingham. 5. "In down to the present time. Mr. Smyth was an industrious and minute collector of heraldic and mo 5." Inscriptiones Sepulchrales; containing a Collection of the most remarkable Inscriptions belonging to the Persons of Families of chief Note in the County of Huntingdon, and some other Counties; copied mostly from those collected by the late Mr. John Clement, junior, of Woodston. Mr. Clement's Collection (taken in 1731, &c.) being found often faulty, and especially in the arms, many of the Churches have been reviewed since his Death, and the whole of them made exact," This is a volume of 297 pages, in 4to, closely written; and contains many inscriptions in the counties of Bedford, Cambridge, Northampton, Lincoln, Salop, and Stafford; and some few in Suffolk, Derbyshire, and Nottinghamshire. 6. A folio volume (108 pages closely written) of "Additions and Corrections to the Baronetage of England, collected from the last Edition in 1741 to 1758, by R. S.; taking, in the Transcript, the several Baronets in the Order of their Creation." A considerable number of Mr. Smyth's letters to Mr. Wotton are placed in this volume; is accompanied also by three folio volumes of Collections on the same subject by that very curious and unwearied Antiquary Peter Le Neve, esq. (Notroy King of Arms); to which Mr. Wotton acknowledges "more than ordinary obligation, as having been of the greatest use to him" in the edition of 1741; and "which take in," he adds, " such a variety of materials, proper to such works," that they "would still be of a great deal more, if the Baronetage should be thought worthy hereafter, of another impression." I may add, more particularly if an extinct Baronetage should ever be undertaken. 7. " A Copy of the Visitation Book for Hampshire, 1613, by Sir Nicholas Charles, Lancaster Heraid, taken by R. S. April 16, 1751, &c. from a MS. in the Library of the Rev. Mr. Thomas Fairfax, who died rector of Eynesbury, 1750, December 2; supposed with reason to be communicated to his Ancestor, a Lover of Antiquity, from the family of Cotton, Baronets in this County, and now given back to it on Mr. Fairfax's death. This Copy is taken verbatim, and no Additions made to it (as in the Visitation of Derbyshire, by R. S. transcribed, &c.). Where any such there is now done, or may be hereafter, it will be seen and distinguished by being placed on the Sides with proper Notes of Reference." 8. "A Copy of the Visitation Book of Cheshire, ann. 1513, taken, 1752, by R. S. from one in the Possession of Tho. Weston, of Point Pleasant, in Kingston, Surrey, Gent. In the front stands one of the most valuable Parts of it, an alphabetical List of the Gentry's arms blazoned." Copies, transcribed by other hands, of the Visitation of Cambridgeshire, 1575; and also of Sussex, 1565; and Berks, .... The articles marked 1-5 are still mine. Ralph Bigland, esq. Norroy king of arms, possesses No. 6. The Visitations are dispersed. VOL. V. E numental numental notes; but, unfortunately, too confined in circumstances, either to afford the leisure, or to run the hazard, of committing the result of his researches to the press. Sir JOHN HAWKINS's Account of Mr. CAVE, and of several of his EARLY ASSOCIATES *. Speaking of the Translation of Father Paul, Sir John says, "Cave's acquiescence in the above proposal drew Johnson into a close intimacy with him: he was much at St. John's Gate; [which 'when Johnson first saw, he beheld with reverence' (Boswell, vol. I. p. 85);] and taught Garrick the way thither. Cave had no great relish for mirth, but he could bear it; and having been told by Johnson, that his friend had talents for the Theatre, and was come to London with a view to the profession of an Actor, expressed a wish to see him in some comic character. Garrick readily complied; and, as Cave himself told me, with a little preparation of the room over the great arch of St. John's Gate, and with the assistance of a few journeymen printers, who were called together for the purpose of reading the other parts, represented, with all the graces of comic humour, the principal character in Fielding's farce of the Mock Doctor. "Cave's temper was phlegmatic: though he assumed, as the publisher of the Magazine, the name of Sylvanus Urban, he had few of those qualities that constitute the character of urbanity. Judge of his want of them by this question, which he once put to an Author: Mr. - I hear you have just published a pamphlet, and am told there is a very good paragraph in it upon the subject of Music: did you write that yourself?" His discernment was also slow; and as he had already at his command * It would be injustice to Sir John Hawkins, if I did not observe, that, in a second edition, he softened several of the expressions which tended to reflect on the memory of Mr. Cave. See pp. 54, 56. some some writers of prose and verse, who in the language of Booksellers are called good hands *, he was * "Mr. Moses Browne, originally a pen-cutter, was, so far as concerned the poetical part of it, the chief support of the Magazine, which he fed with many a nourishing morsel. This person, being a lover of angling, wrote Piscatory Eclogues; and was a candidate for the fifty pound prize mentioned in Johnson's first letter to Cave, and for other prizes which Cave engaged to pay him who should write the best poem on certain subjects; in all or most of which competitions Mr. Browne had the good fortune to succeed. He published these and other poems of his writing, in an octavo volume, Lond. 1739; and has therein given proofs of an exuberant fancy and a happy invention. Some years after he entered into holy orders. A farther account of him may be seen in the Biographia Dramatica, to a place in which work he seems to have acquired a title by some juvenile compositions for the stage. Being a person of a religious turn, he also published in verse a series of devout contemplations, called Sunday Thoughts. Johnson, who often expressed his dislike of religious poetry, and who, for the purpose of religious meditation, seemed to think one day as proper as another, read them with cold approbation, and said, he had a great mind to write and publish Monday Thoughts.-To the proofs above adduced of the coarseness of Cave's manners, let me add the following: he had undertaken, at his own risk, to publish a translation of Du Halde's History of China, in which were contained sundry geographical and other plates. Each of these he inscribed to one or other of his friends; and, among the rest, one to Moses Browne. With this blunt and familiar designation of his person, Mr. Browne was justly offended. To appease him, Cave directed an engraver, to introduce with a caret under the line, Mr.; and thought, that in so doing, he had made ample amends to Mr. Browne for the indignity done him. "Mr. John Duick, also a pen-cutter, and a near neighbour of Cave, was a frequent contributor to the Magazine, of short poems, written with spirit and ease. He was a kinsman of Browne, and the author of a good copy of encomiastic verses prefixed to the collection of Browne's Poems above mentioned. "Mr. Foster Webb, a young man who had received his edu cation in Mr. Watkins's academy in Spital-square, and afterwards became clerk to a merchant in the city was at first a contributor to the Magazine, of enigmas, a species of poetry in which he then delighted, but was dissuaded from it by the following lines, which appeared in the Magazine for October 1740, after a few successful essays in that kind of writing; Too modest Bard, with enigmatic veil the backwarder in making advances, or courting an intimacy with Johnson. Upon the first approach Do thou, like him, avow thy native flame, Burst through the gloom, and brighten into fame.' "After this friendly exhortation, Mr. Webb, in those hours of leisure which business afforded, amused himself with translating from the Latin Classics, particularly Ovid and Horace: from the latter of these he rendered into English verse, with better success than any that had before attempted it, the Odes, "Quis multa gracilis te puer in rosa;" "Solvitur acris hyems grata vice veris, et Favoni;" "Parcus Deorum cultor et infrequens ;" and "Diffugere nives, redeunt jam gramina campis;" all which are inserted in Cave's Magazine. His signature was sometimes Telarius, at others Vedastus. He was a modest, ingenious, and sober young man; but a consumption defeated the hopes of his friends, and took him off in the twenty-second year of his age. "Mr. John Smith, another of Mr. Watkins's pupils, was a writer in the Magazine, of prose essays, chiefly on religious and moral subjects, and died of a decline about the same time. "Mr. John Canton, apprenticed to the above-named Mr. Watkins, and also his successor in his academy, was a contributor to the Magazine, of verses, and afterwards, of papers on philosophical and mathematical subjects. The discoveries he made in electricity and magnetism are well known, and are recorded in the Transactions of the Royal Society, of which he afterwards became a member. "Mr. William Rider, bred in the same prolific seminary, was a writer in the Magazine, of verses signed Philargyrus. He went from school to Jesus college, Oxford, and, some years after his leaving the same, entered into holy orders, and became surmaster of St. Paul's school, in which office he continued many years, but at length was obliged to quit that employment by reason of his deafness. “Mr. Adam Calamy, son of Dr. Edmund Calamy, an eminent Non-conformist Divine, and author of the Abridgment of Mr. Baxter's History of his Life and Times, was another of Mr. Watkins's pupils, that wrote in the Magazine; the subjects on which he chiefly exercised his pen were essays in polemical theology and republican politics; and he distinguished them by the assumed signature of A consistent Protestant. He was bred to the profession of an attorney, and was brother to Mr. Edmund Calamy, a Dissenting teacher, of eminence for his worth and learning. "A seminary, of a higher order than that above-mentioned, viz. the academy of Mr. John Eames in Moor-fields, furnished the Magazine with a number of other correspondents in mathematics and other branches of science and polite literature. This was an institution supported by the Dissenters, the design whereof was to qualify young men for their ministry. Mr. Eames was formerly the continuator of the abridgement of the Philosophical «Trans: |