that of Virgil's Melibæus, of about one hundred acres. I immediately sent your poem* to Ballantyne, without the least intimation whence it comes. But I greatly doubt his venturing on the publication, nor can I much urge him to it. The disputes of the Huttonians and Wernerians, though they occasioned, it is said, the damning of a tragedy in Edinburgh last month, have not agitated our northern Athens in any degree like the disputes between the Bellonians and Lancastrians. The Bishop of Meath,† some time a resident with us, preached against the Lancastrian system in our Episcopal chapel. The Rev. Sir Henry Moncrieff, a Scottish Baronet, and leader of the stricter sect of the Presbyterians, replied in a thundering discourse of an hour and a half in length. Now, every body being engaged on one side or the other, I believe no one will care to bring forth a poem which laughs at both. As for me, upon whom the suspicion of authorship would probably attach, I say with Mrs. Quickly, I will never put my finger in the fire, and need not! indeed no, la!" I fear many of the short-hand acquisitions will be found " in fancy ripe, in reason rotten." After all, however, this applies chiefly to the easier and higher classes; for, as to the lower, we are to consider the saving of time in learning as the means of teaching many who otherwise would not learn at all. So I quietly subscribe to both schools, and give my name to neither. I trust the charlatanism of both systems will subside into something useful. I have no good opinion of either of the champions. Lancaster is a mountebank; and there is a certain lawsuit depending in our courts here between Dr. Bell and his wife, which puts him in a very questionable point of view. Believe me, dear Sir, yours ever truly, W. SCOTT. TO THE REV. R. POlwhele. Abbotsford, Nov. 4, 1815. MY DEAR, SIR,-I have been a long and distant wanderer from home; and, though I reached this cottage six weeks ago, I only got "Isabel" yesterday. She was in my house at Castle Street, in possession of an old "The Deserted Village School." housekeeper; who, knowing perhaps from youthful experience the dangers which attend young ladies on their travels, kept her with some other captives until my wife, going to town to attend a grand musical festival, made a general jail delivery, and sent among many, but none so welcome packets, the fair maiden of Cotehele. What I liked so much in manuscript, gained of course by being made more legible; and, did it rest with me, would rank " Isabel" with "Local Attachment," that is with one of the poems of modern times which has afforded me the most sincere pleasure. I will not fail to put into the hands of Mr. Jeffrey the copy you have sent for him, and to request him to read it with attention. The rest must depend on his own taste. But I will deliver the work with my own hand. No time is yet lost; for Mr. Jeffrey, like myself and other gaping sawnies, has for some time been in France. 1 am ignorant if he be yet returned; but at any rate the sitting of the courts, which calls me from my oaks of a fathom's growth, will bring him also to Edinburgh. My stay in France, which was pretty long for a flying visit, has still more endeared my own country, and the manly rectitude of its morals and simplicity of its habits. Adieu, my dear Sir. Your obliged and faithful servant, WALTER SCOTT. At an earlier period, in 1808, Sir Walter had told Mr. Polwhele: "It may be necessary to say, however, that I myself have no voice in the management of the Quarterly Review, and am only a sincere well-wisher and occasional contributor to the work. The management is in much better hands; but I am sure Mr. Gifford will be as sensible of the value of your co-operation as I should be in his situation." We cannot conclude without observing, that, in a letter to Mr. J. B. Nichols, Sir Walter professes his respect for the literary patriarchs, Cave and Nichols," as well as for the GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE, "from which," he says, "I have often derived and continue to derive, a quantity of literary information not to be seen elsewhere." This was written in Dec. 1829. Mr. URBAN, Welbeck Street, Nov. 7. FROM a notice in one of your late Numbers (p. 61), and from observations in other periodicals, my attention was lately called to some Stained Glass at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, a visit to which afforded me a most delightful morning's occupation. I found myself surveying the works of one of the greatest artists the world ever produced, Albert Durer. It is impossible for a moment to resist the inclination one feels imposed, of attributing the above specimen to him, inasmuch as the great similarity of style, in this and the glass at Fairford, Gloucestershire (which there is every reasonable plea for attributing to his hand, notwithstanding Mr. Dallaway's observation), and also in many of his numerous works both in this country and on the Continent, places it beyond all doubt. There is such an extraordinary identity in the figures and their arrangement, as to render it impossible to be mistaken. One frame in particular caught my attention, that which depicts the benefit of clergy being extended to a criminal. Can any one for a moment behold the figure of the executioner and doubt its origin? The colours too are certainly very splendid; there is some exquisite ruby, blue, and amber; the velvets and damasked dresses are gorgeous, and in design, freedom of drawing, depth and extraordinary perspective, it far surpasses (in my estimation) any thing I have yet seen. You observed with truth, that it has not so deep a tone of colouring, and that the glass is not quite so much covered as some of a rather earlier date; but whether this is in its favour or not, I leave others to determine, although I incline to the opinion, that it is a proof of its superiority and value, and that the mind with such power of conception was accompanied by a hand of such power of execution, as needed not the usual gloom to hide the more elaborate and beautiful drawing for which this specimen stands pre-eminent. But I advance this only as an opinion; at all events, to depict the minute details so absolutely necessary in glass of this clear and cheerful character, is, I venture to submit, a sufficient proof its author had no fear of the results. Out of about 30 frames, more or less, there appear two or three not deserving so much notice, and I almost regret the proprietor has not kept them back or placed them by themselves; but, excluding them, sufficient remains to form a pictorial display much exceeding 200 square feet of, to me, unequalled beauty. I need not point out to you, Mr. Urban, the feelings that must arise in every cultivated mind, upon the consideration that these storied panes have outlived, fragile and precious as they are, the stone and marble of the edifice which originally contained them; and how often we are assisted in clearing up historical doubts by the armorial shields, the portraits, dates, and legends, in which this is so abundant, and which are generally met with in the article in question. The falling off in all modern productions of this nearly lost art, cannot be too much regretted; and, notwithstanding the specimen now offered to public inspection is somewhat carelessly got up, no pains having been apparently taken to clean it, or repair the very slight fractures that a period of three centuries has inflicted,-notwithstanding these disadvantages, let it be compared with modern attempts-place it beside the window at Trinity College, Cambridge, by Peckitt (which contains 140 square feet, and cost 500l.), and but little time will be expended in coming to a decision, as to ancient or modern claims upon our admiration. I could multiply comparisons that would compel conviction; but I have already occupied too much of your valued pages. It is, however, a fine opportunity for those erecting extensive buildings, whether public or private, to procure a species of decoration, so rare and so beautiful, and which is of course diminishing at a fearful rate, and can never be replaced. In concluding, I shall take the liberty of observing, that an alteration for the better might be made in the present arrangement of the glass in question. Surely the western and eastern windows should change places; as it is now exhibited, some part by far the most precious I have ever seen, may casily escape observation. A CONSTANT READER AND Mr. URBAN, Nov. 1. A VIEW of Saint George's Tower, a solitary relic of the once-formidable castle of Oxford, will it is hoped be deemed an appropriate illustration of your valuable Magazine, which has uniformly distinguished itself by a predilection for our national antiquities. The origin of this ancient structure is blended in the same obscurity which envelopes the history of the city to which it appertains; and the labours of Camden, Wood, Hearne, King, and other antiquaries, have failed to dispel the gloom which hangs over this important question. The well-known facts of the residence of Offa, when Oxford was included within the limits of his kingdom of Mercia, of Alfred the Great, after the heptarchy had merged in the kingdom of England, and of Canute the Dane, together with the ceremonial of the Coronation of Harold Harefoot, sufficiently demonstrate the existence of a regal mansion at Oxford in the time of the Saxons; and the silence of Domesdaybook affords strong presumption that that mansion was no other than the Castle, which at the time of the Norman survey was held by Robert d'Oiley, to whom it was granted in 1067 by William I. in acknowledgment of the services he had rendered the Conqueror during the invasion and subjugation of his newly-acquired kingdom. Under that powerful Baron, Oxford Castle gained much additional importance as a fortress, being augmented and partly rebuilt on a stronger and grander scale; d'Oiley also founded and liberally endowed a chapel, which speedily became a parish —and even a collegiate church, within the precincts of the castle. The external enclosure appears to have been formed by a strong octagonal wall and moat, the latter being filled with water from a branch of the Isis, which flows under the south-western boundary. Four strong and lofty towers; two gates, one of them accessible only by means of a long and well-fortified bridge; a donjon or keep, elevated on an immense mound of earth, and commanding the adjoining city and country; together with the sacred edifice before mentioned; constituted the principal features of the ancient fortress, which wanted not suitable buildings for the accommodation of the numerous GENT. MAG. November, 1832. ecclesiastical and civil dependants necessary to the splendour of feudal magnificence. Here in 1141 the Empress Maud was besieged by Stephen; and her escape by night, in a white dress, during a severe frost, and when the ground was covered by snow, has been often related. Little alteration appears to have been made in the general form and appearance of the castle until after the civil wars. In 1649 Colonel Ingoldsby, the Parliamentarian Governor, demolished great part of the ancient buildings and fortifications, and in their stead erected some expensive works on the mount of the old keep; but these soon fell into decay, and were removed in their turn. Upon the conversion of the Castle into the county gaol, the dilapidated and ruinous edifices of former times necessarily gave place to erections more appropriate to its modern destination; yet, after all these mutations, the Tower of Saint George remains an interesting specimen of castellated architecture, of a date little posterior to the era of the Norman Conquest, and probably owing its existence to one of the actors in that national tragedy. The characteristics of this building are simplicity and strength; it is divided into stories by a diminution, at the proper stages, of the solidity of its walls, which at the basement are of prodigious thickness; and security being the first object of its erection, it presents on its external faces, the north and west, no openings but in the parapet, which has been carried up considerably above the roof, and pierced with loopholes for arrows. The apartments of its dismal interior are now seldom used, those dungeons being reserved for offenders of peculiar atrocity. The surrounding houses, although adjoining the Castle, are unconnected with it. The buildings which stand on the river are corn mills. Mr. URBAN, X. H.M.S. Ocean, Sheerness, Nov. 2. IF you think my account of Agriculture in Normandy will make any of my countrymen more contented with their own lot, I beg you will make use of it. I believe it to be correct. |