hild Street, mentioned by old hiftorians, but which has long been loft in the uncertainty of topographical defcription.

Art. VII. A Letter from the Rev. Dr. Sharp, Archdeacon of Northumberland, tending to confirm Mr. Cade's opinion. Art. VIII. Mr. Bray on the Leicester Roman Military Stone. Though Leicester is generally fuppofed to be the Rate Coritanorum of the Romans, it has been doubted by fome antiquaries; but, by a ftone lately difcovered near that town, and described by Mr. Bray, the common opinion is confirmed.

Art. IX. Observations on the present Aldbrough Church at Holderness, proving that it was not a Saxon building, as' Mr. Somerset contends. By the Rev. Mr. Pegge.—We shall lay thefe obfervations before our readers.

• The infcription Mr. Somerfet has produced is not of great antiquity, as he ftates, for Ulf, who firft put it up, flourished but in the reign of king Edward the Confeffor. However, it is a Saxon infcription, and fufficiently both ancient and cu rious to merit the attention of our Society. But the inference drawn from this conceffion, viz. that Aldbrough church, as now exifting, is a fabric erected in the Saxon times, or before the Norman conqueft, appears to me to be liable to two very fpecious, not to lay formidable objections.

First, there was no church at Aldbrough when Domefday furvey was made, the record being entirely filent as to that particular; and yet, I prefume, all the churches then in being are there very punctually recited. It may be faid, perhaps, in reply to this, that the church at Kirkdale, where a Saxon infcription alfo occurs, is not mentioned in Domesday Book. I answer, that the fabric at Kirkdale cannot be expected to appear there, as it was not properly a church, i. e. a rectory endowed with tythes, but only a chapel of ease.

The fecond objection is, that this ftructure does not present us with any refemblance of Saxon architecture, but on the contrary, every thing there favours of a poft-normannic æra. Mr. Brooke himself confeffes," it now has a more modern appearance;" but this he endeavours to account for " from the fucceffion of repairs it has undergone, and the addition of windows very different from the original lights." A fuggeftion which may be admitted in regard to this or that part of a church; but furely, fir, can by no means fuffice for a whole and entire building. The arches within, which can never be thought to have been altered or repaired, thofe of the windows, and that of the door-way into the chancel, are all elliptic, a mode of building never feen, I believe, in any Saxon erection whatsoever. There is, it feems, fome hewn ftone-work in the lower part of the fouth wall of the chancel, "fuch, fays Mr. Brooke, as was generally used in our most ancient cathedral churches."

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churches." A circumftance which, in my opinion, militates very strongly in favour of the recent erection of this church, our cathedrals of this ftyle of building being all posterior to the Conqueft. It is obferved, again, that there is fome zigzag work in the door of the chancel, and upon this some brass is laid, Mr. Brooke remarking, in regard to this particular, "that this was a ftyle peculiar to the Saxon architecture." This now appears to be plaufible; but it should be remembered on the other hand, that though our Saxon ancestors often applied this fpecies of ornament, as here ftated and alledged, yet we find the fucceeding architects did not fo totally forfake it, but that they fometimes retained it; witnefs the zigzac mouldings, noticed by Mr. Denne, as occurring in poft-normannic ftructures.

But now you will afk, how then do you reconcile this Saxon infcription, fo pofitive and exprefs, with the fuppofed recency, or polt-normannic erection of this church? This, fir, I acknow ledge, is a difficulty not eafily to be removed; and I, for my part, can only do it by a fuppofition, which you will think but barely poffible; to wit, that Ulf built a church, which in a few years, and by fome means now unknown, was destroyed and lay in ruins, A. 1080, when Domesday Book was made: that when the prefent fabric was erected, the old ftone with its infcription, which had happily been preferved, was put up in the new structure, and in the place it now occupies: and lastly, that in all probability, Odo earl of Champaigne, Albemarle and Holderness, or his fon Stephen, was the person who founded the prefent church; if at last it was built fo early.'

Art. X. Particulars relative to a Human Skeleton, and the Garments that were found thereon, when dug out of a Bog at the Foot of Drumkeragh, a Mountain in the County of Down, and barony of Kinalearty, on Lord Moira's Estate, in the Autumn of 1780. By the Countess of Moira.-The particulars concerning this skeleton, fo far as they could be collected from the imperfect evidence procured by lady Moira, are related with great precifion, and accompanied with fuch obfervations on antiquities as do the highest honour to her ladyfhip's literary accomplishments. Amidft our fincere regret at the failure of all the endeavours which were exerted by this illuftrious lady for obtaining more explicit information, we have the fatisfaction to find that she perfeveres in the hope of yet furmounting the obftacles which have hitherto fruftrated her enquiry. When a lady of fuch eminence contributes her efforts towards the cultivation of antiquarian researches, her example cannot fail of producing the most advantageous effects.

Art. XI. A further Account of Difcoveries in the Turf Bogs of Ireland. By Richard Lovell Edgeworth.-This ar ticle mentions a coat found ten years ago fifteen feet under ground

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ground, in a turf bog or peat mofs. With it were many hundred iron heads of arrows, fome bowls of beech and alder, and other wooden utenfils, many of which were unfinished, and two or three facks full of nuts. In the fame place were the remains of a work-fhop, &c. which favour the author's conjecture that this fpot had probably been a large wood, where turners had been employed; to one of whom the uncouth habit is fuppofed to have belonged. 'The texture of the coat was fuch as the knitters and weavers of Ireland, we are told, are unable to imitate.

Art. XII. On the Progrefs of Gardening. By the Hon. Daines Barrington.-This well-informed writer, with his ufual learning, traces the progress of horticulture from the earliest accounts of it in the ancient hiftorians and poets. The gardens first mentioned are thofe of Solomon, Babylon, Alcinous, and Laertes, with the gardens of Lucullus and Auguftus Cæfar; but it should feem, our author obferves, that the two laft were walks, with regular plantations of trees, as Virgil. in his Georgics, recommends the form of a quincunx.

"Non animum modo uti pafcat profpectus inanem.” In the private gardens of the Romans he remarks, that there were commonly fweet fmelling fhrubs and flowers; in fupport of which opinion he produces a paffage from Horace. But he evinces, by the authority of Martial, that towards the end. of the first century, the prevailing tafte was to have clipt box amongst myrtles and planes. About the fame period, likewife, the Romans appear to have found out the method of forcing rofes, which it had formerly been the cuftom to obtain from Egypt, at great expence.

Our author juftly obferves, that upon the fall of the Roman empire, little attention can be supposed to have been paid to gardening. Since that period, therefore, the earliest defcription of any such inclosure which he has found, is that belonging to the Hotel de St. Paul, at Paris, made by Charles the Fifth of France, about the year 1364. In this garden were apples, pears, cherries, and vines, befide peas and beans, beds of rofemary and lavender, with very large arbours.

Mr. Barrington obferves, that in the beginning of the fixteenth century there were green-houfes in England, as appears from one of Leland's poems entitled, Horti Gulielmi Guntheri, hyeme vernantes.' In the Itinerary of the fame author, mention is made of the gardens at Morle in Derbyshire, at Wrexhill, on the Oufe in Yorkshire, and at the Castle of Thornbury.

Thefe three inftances, fays Mr. Barrington, feem to fhew, what were the gardens commonly which belonged to confider

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able houfes in the time of Henry the Eighth, but in the fifth volume of the Archæologia we have feveral other particulars relative to that king's garden, at his favourite and magnificent palace of Nonfuch.

1 hefe circumstances appear in a furvey taken in the year 1650, when it probably continued in exactly the fame ftate as it was at the death of Henry the Eighth.

It is herein ftated to have been cut out and divided into feveral allies, quarters, and rounds, fet about with thorn hedges. On the north fide was a kitchen garden, very commodious, and furrounded with a brick wall of tourteen feet high. On the weft was a wilderness, fevered from the little park by the hedge, the whole containing ten acres. In the privy garden were pyramids, fountains, and balons of marble, one of which is fet round with fix lelack trees, which trees bear no fruite, but only a very pleataunte flower.

In the privy garden were also one hundred and forty fruit trees, two yews, one juniper, and fix letacks. In the kitchen garden were feventy-two fruit trees, and one time tree. Lastly, before this palace, was a neate and haundfome bowling-green, furrounded with a balluftrade of free stone.

In this garden, therefore, at Nonfuch, we find many fuch ornaments of old English gardening, as prevailed till the modern taste was introduced by Kent.

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During the reign of queen Elizabeth, there was an Italian who vifited England, and publifhed, in 1586, a thick volume of Latin poems, divided into feveral books. This poet styles himfelf Meliffus.

In this collection there is a poem on the royal garden, one ftanza of which defcribes a labyrinth, and it thould feem from the following lines, that her majefty was curious in flowers, and perhaps a botanist.

'Cultor herbarum, memor atque florum,

Atque radicum fub humo latentum, et
Stirpium prifca, et nova fingularum
Nomina fignet.'

And again,

Non opis noftræ frutices ad unguem
Perfequi cunctos, variafque plantas.'

During the reign of this queen, Hentzner informs us, that there was in the privy garden a jet d'eau, which by turning of the cock, wetted all the fpectators who were standing

near it.

Liberneau, who wrote his Maison Ruftique about the fame time, advises arbours of jeffamine or rofes, box, juniper, and cypress, to be introduced into gardens, and gives fome wooden plates of forms for parterres, and labyrinths. The fame tafte prevailed in Spain and Italy.

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⚫ James

James the First built, or at least improved, the palace of Theobalds, to which he likewife added a garden, thus described by Mandelflo, a traveller who visited England in 1640.

"It is large and fquare, having all its walls covered with fillery, and a beautiful jet d'eau in the centre. The parterre hath many pleafant walks, many of which are planted on the fides with efpaliers, and others arched over. Some of the trees are limes and elms, and at the end is a small mount called the Mount of Venus, which is placed in the midst of a labyrinth, and is upon the whole, one of the most beautiful spots in the world."

This fame traveller defcribes alfo the garden at Greenwich (much improved by James the First), in which he mentions a ftatue pouring water from a cornu copiæ, and a grotto.

About the fame time Mandelflo vifited Bruffels, and in forms us that in the midst of a lake adjoining to the palace, there is a fquare houfe built upon pillars, which, perhaps was one of the first fummer-houfes in fuch a fituation,

Charles the First is well known to have been in the earlier part of his reign an encourager of the elegant arts; but I have not happened to meet with any proofs of attention to the gar dens of his palaces, if the appointing Parkinfon to be his her barist be excepted, which office, it is believed, was first created by this king.

• Improvements of the fame kind were little to be expected from the commonwealth, or Cromwell; but Charles the Second being fond both of playing at mall, and walking in St. James's. Park, planted fome rows of limes, and dug the canal, both which fill remain. He alfo covered the central walk with cockle-fhells, and inftituted the office of cockle-ftrewer. It was fo well kept during this reign that Waller calls it "the polifhed mall." He alfo mentions that Charles the Second (probably from this circumftance) was able to ftrike the ball more than half the length of the walk.

Lord Capel feems to have been the first perfon of confe quence in England, who was at much expence in his gardens, and having brought over with him many new fruits from France, be planted them at Kew.

'Lord Effex had the fame tafte, and fent his gardener Rofe to ftudy the then much celebrated beauties of Versailles. Upon Rofe's return, Charles the Second appointed him royal gardener, when he planted fuch famous dwarfs at Hampton Court, Carlton, and Marlborough Gardens, that London (who was Rofe's apprentice) challenges all Europe to produce the like.

I fhould rather conceive that this king had the first hot and ice-house (which generally accompany each other) ever built in England, as at the inftallation dinner given at Windfor, on the twenty-third of April 1667, there were cherries, strawberries, and ice-creams.?

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