is plainly a layman, and probably Sir Anthony Denny, who was a benefactor to the college.

What is come of your Sevigné curiosity? I should be glad of a line now and then, when you have leisure. I wish you well, And am ever yours,

LETTER CXXV.

MR. GRAY TO MR. BENTHAM.

TO THE REV. MR. BENTHAM.

T. GRAY.

About the year 1765.

MR. GRAY returns the papers and prints to Mr. Bentham, with many thanks for the sight of them.

Concludes he has laid aside his intention of publishing the first four sections of his Introduction, that contain the settlement and progress of Christianity among the Saxons; as (however curious and instructive of themselves) they certainly have too slight a connection with the subject in hand to make a part of the present work.

Has received much entertainment and information from his remarks on the state of Architecture among the Saxons, and

thinks he has proved his point against the authority of Stow and Somner. The words of Eddius, Richard of Hexham, &c. must be every where cited in the original tongue, as the most accurate translation is in these cases not to be trusted; this Mr. B. has indeed commonly done in the MSS. but not every where.

P. 31. He says, the instances Sir C. Wren brings, were, some of them at least, undoubtedly erected after the Conquest. Sure they were all so without exception.

There is much probability in what he asserts with respect to the New Norman Mode of building; though this is. not, nor perhaps can be, made out with so much precision as the former point.

P. 35. Here, where the Author is giving a compendious view of the peculiarities that distinguish the Saxon style, it might be mentioned, that they had no tabernacles (or niches and canopies), nor any statues to adorn their buildings on the outside, which are the principal grace of what is called the Gothick; the only exception that I can recollect, is a little figure of Bishop Herebert Losing over the north transept door at Norwich, which appears to be of that time: but this is rather a mezzo-relievo than a statue, and it is well known that they used reliefs sometimes with profusion, as in the Saxon gateway of the Abbey at Bury, the gate of the Temple church at London, and the two gates at Ely, &c.

The want of pinnacles and of tracery in the vaults, are afterwards mentioned, but may as well be placed here too (in short) among the other characteristics.

Escutcheons of arms are hardly (if ever) seen in these fabrics, which are the most frequent of all decorations in after-times.

P. 34. Beside the chevron-work (ar zig-zag moulding) so common, which is here mentioned, there is also,

The Billeted-moulding, as if a cylinder should be cut into small pieces of equal length, and these stuck on alternately round the face of the arches, as in the choir at Peterborough, and at St. Cross, &c.

The Nail-head, resembling the heads of great nails driven in at regular distances, as in the nave of old St. Paul's, and the great tower of Hereford, &c.

The Nebule, a projection terminated by an undulating line as under the upper range of windows, on the outside of Peterborough.

Then to adorn their vast massive columns there was the spiral-grove winding round the shafts, and the net, or lozengework, overspreading them, both of which appear at Durham, and the first in the undercroft at Canterbury.

These few things are mentioned only, because Mr. Bentham's work is so nearly complete in this part, that one would wish it were quite so. His own observation may doubtless suggest to him many more peculiarities, which, however minute in ap pearance, are not contemptible, because they directly belong to

his subject, and contribute to ascertain the age of 2

an edifice at first sight. The great deficiency is from Henry VIth's time to the Reformation, when the art was indeed at its height.

P. 36. At York, under the choir, remains much of the old work, built by Archbishop Roger, of Bishop's-bridge, in Henry IId's reign; the arches are but just pointed, and rise on short round pillars, whose capitals are adorned with animals and foliage.

P. 37. Possibly the pointed arch might take its rise from those arcades we see in the early Norman (or Saxon) buildings on walls, where the wide semicircular arches cross and intersect each other, and form thereby at their intersection exactly In the wall south of the a narrow and sharp-pointed arch. choir at St. Cross, is a facing of such wide, round, interlaced arches by way of ornament to a flat vacant space; only so much of it as lies between the legs of the two neighbouring arches, where they cross each other, is pierced through the fabric, and forms a little range of long pointed windows. It is of King Stephen's time.

P. 43. As Mr. B. has thought it proper to make a com pliment to the present set of governors in their respective churches, it were to be wished he would insert a little reflection on the rage of repairing, beautifying, whitewashing, painting, and gilding, and above all, the mixture of Greek (or Roman) ornaments in Gothic edifices. This well-meant fury has been and will be little less fatal to our ancient magnificent edifices, than the Reformation and the civil wars.

Mr. G. would wish to be told (at Mr. Bentham's leisure) whether over the great pointed arches, on which the western tower at Ely rises, any thing like a semicircular curve appears in the stone work? and whether the screen (or rood-loft) with some part of the south-cross, may not possibly be a part of the more ancient church built by Abbot Simeon and FitzGilbert.

LETTER CXXVI.

MR. GRAY TO DR. WHARTON.

March 5, 1766. Pemb. C.

DEAR DOCTOR,

I AM amazed at myself when I think I have never wrote to you; to be sure it is the sin of witchcraft, or something worse. Something indeed might be said for it, had I been married like Mason, who (for the first time since that great event) has just thought fit to tell me, that he never passed so happy a winter as the last; and this in spite of his anxieties, which perhaps (he says) might even make a part of his happiness: for his wife is by no means in health; she has a constant cough, yet he is assured her lungs are not affected, and that it is nothing of the consumptive kind. What say you to this case? May I flatter him that breeding will be a cure for this disorder? If so, I hear she is in a fair way to be well. As to me, I have been neither happy nor miserable, but in a gentle stupefaction of mind, and very tolerable health of body, hitherto: if they last, I shall not much complain. The accounts one has lately had from all parts make me suppose you buried under the snow, like the old Queen of Denmark. As soon as you are dug out, I should rejoice to hear your voice from the battlements of Old Park. The greatest cold we have felt here was Jan. 2: Thermom. (in the garden) at four in the afternoon, standing at 30% Deg. and next day fell a little snow, which did not lie: it was the first we had