and instruction. But by himself none of these things were held in any price. They seemed to flow spontaneously, and without an effort, from the natural kindness of his heart; and he well knew, that his hopes of happiness hereafter were to be built upon a very different foundation from any merit of his own.

With respect to his moral character, it is impossible to speak in too high terms; he was severe in his judgment of himself and his own errors, but candour itself with regard to others. He was a most dutiful and affectionate son, a kind and attentive husband, an indulgent master, peculiarly and zealously attached to all his relations, and indefatigable in promoting their interests. Above all he was a most faithful and invaluable friend.

The writer of this memoir cannot help concluding it with the following sentence, which he received in a letter from Mr. Blakeway, at an important period of his life; and he gives it, not only as intrinsically valuable for the advice which it contains, but as an exposition of those principles which guided Mr. Blakeway's own life, and afforded him consolation at the close of it :-" Above all, believe on the word of an old man, who can have no motive to deceive you, that Virtue alone is happiness below. And depend upon it, if you live to my years, you will find that, however specious the external appearance of happiness in alliance with vice may be, it is all unreal. God has appointed an irreversable decree, which connects it with misery alone. Of virtue, religion is the only substantial basis. Examine, therefore, the evidence of Revelation; and having found it, as I trust you will find it, built upon a rock, keep a firm hold of it, and never let it go. Do the will of God, and you will learn of the doctrine whether it be of Him."

1. Mr. BLAKEWAY to RICHARD GOUGH, Esq.

"SIR, Kinlet, Shropshire, May 25, 1802. "I have this moment received Du Chesne's Norman Historians, accompanied by a letter from Mr. Churton, informing me to whom I am indebted for the use of them. As this letter is dated so long ago as the 12th of this month, you will, I fear, be in some pain for this valuable book; but it is arrived quite safe and uninjured; and the delay has only been owing to our distance from all public conveyances. I am quite at a loss, Sir, to express the grateful sense which I entertain of your singular humanity in condescending to lend me a piece, from which I expect so much interesting information touching the Norman portion of Salopian history; my attachment to the study of which will be still further augmented by the reflection, that it has procured me the honour of receiving so high an obligation from you, as I had in vain sought for Ordericus in all the best libraries in this part of the world. I shall devour my countryman with all the avidity and expedition which are compatible with my professional duties, that he may return to his place in your library as soon as possible; and in the mean while, I remain, Sir, your most obliged and grateful servant,

2. " SIR,

J. B. BLAKEWAY."

Kinlet, near Bewdley, June 19, 1802. "I have many thanks to return for your obliging letter, and permission to retain Ordericus a little longer. I have already got through seven books of his thirteen, and had hoped to have been able to return him at the furthest within the two months, but having had my house full of company for the last fortnight, it has not been in my power to look into him for that time; and I have the prospect of being debarred from his society for another space of equal time, by the necessity of a visit on Monday into Warwickshire. I fear, therefore, I must crave leave to keep him a few weeks over the time I had proposed to myself; as he is by no ineans an author to be hurried over; and it is no small credit to my native county to have, at so early a period, produced a writer of so much intelligence, information, and piety. His puerile miracles are a disgrace rather to the age in which he lived, and the cloister in which he was immured, than to the man himself.

"Your condescending and encouraging expressions relative to the object I have in view, are received with much gratitude, and will, if God continues to me health and strength, operate as a powerful inducement to complete it. Of the Mytton papers I have had a promise from Mr. Richard Hill, who married a sister of Mrs. Mytton's; but as this promise was made two years ago, and is not yet carried into effect, (though the application has been repeated by me, with as much delicacy and

address as I am master of, as often as I see Mr. Hill,) I begin to be less sanguine in my hopes. However, as soon as I am at a stand for want of work to go on with, which is by no means the case yet, I will urge my request with greater warmth. In the mean time I have three MS. folios of the late Mr. Hotchkis, chiefly consisting of extracts from Mr. William Mytton's collections at the Tower and other public offices in London, which the Bishop of Dromore has seen, and thinks of much importance, A fourth volume, of still greater importance, and from which I entered the substance some years ago under my alphabetical index locorum, is now, alas, missing, though perhaps not lost. I have Domesday, the Liber Niger, Testa Nevill, concerning the origin of the name of which I am by no means satisfied, Nomina Villarum, Valor of Pope Nicholas, Escuages from Richard I. to Edward I., Mr. Lethieullier's terrier of lands in Shropshire, and a great variety of other documents from the British Museum, and many other papers necessary to my Prolegomena, all ready; and hope for permission to extract the lists of incumbents from our episcopal registers, as Mr. Mott of Lichfield is my good friend; and when the Bishop of Bristol succeeds to Hereford, I have no fear of a repulse in that quarter. The General History' is my great terror, as I, who know well, quid ferre recusent, quid valeant humeri, know I can never execute it according to my ideas of perfection: I mean, that by reference to all the original historians, and reading them with a critical eye to the times in which they lived, and the means they possessed of information, (which I think is admirably done in Mr. Mitford's History of Greece, but which has not yet been sufficiently attended to in our own history,) and comparing them with records, and the genealogies of his own county, the provincial historian should correct the traditional errors which have been handed down from father to son in the historical department, and act as a check upon the general history of the kingdom. With this view I have gone over the Saxon Chronicle, Gildas, Nennius, and Asser; and have got William of Gemieges and the other writers edited by Camden, Malmesbury, Huntingdon, Hoveden, and Matthew Paris, ready to begin with as soon as I finish Ordericus; but I much fear I must abandon this task, as too arduous for me, or reserve it for a separate work. For this tedious detail, Sir, I ought to apologize, but have been led into it by your kind inquiries, and now hasten to answer the remainder of your letter in as few words as possible. Of my correspondence with Mr. Urban I ought, I fear, to be somewhat ashamed, as, commencing at an early period, it was productive of many puerilities and some petulances. It began almost with my entrance at Oriel College, in a drawing of Edward II's curious standing cup, and was continued occasionally without signature (but as I have not those volumes here, I cannot, if I would, specify the particulars,) till I adopted

that of B. L. A.; which no longer answering the purpose of concealment after I had attempted in our provincial paper to reprimand Dr. Priestley, for his intemperate language after the Birmingham riots, I adopted those of Nugator and Sciolus, (occasionally well adapted to my communications), but for some time past have had no correspondence with the Magazine, which, however, still forms a monthly gratification to me. Such, Sir, is the best answer I can give, without the volumes at hand, (for in one volume, that for the latter half of 1787, which I happen to have here, I see two or three scraps, as at pp. 572. 1080, without any signature) to your query concerning my unfortunate communications. I shall have fulfilled all the objects of this letter, when I have apologized for its length, have noticed my transmission of cur humble genealogy, in which I have, as you desired, noted the graduates of our family, and have subscribed myself, Sir, your most obedient and obliged servant, J. B. BLAKEWAY.'

3. "SIR,

Kinlet, July 16, 1802.

"On my return home from Warwickshire I have just found your obliging letter, for which please to accept my best thanks. I am glad to find that you received the packet safe, for which I was under some apprehensions. I now hasten to answer the queries you put in your letter in the best manner I am able. My distant cousin Richard Blakeway, of St. John's, Cambridge, was not, as you observe, M. D. of that University, or of Oxford, but either of Leyden or Edinburgh, I forget which. During the short time he practised, which was at Birmingham, he acquired the character of a very ingenious and promising young man. He was engaged, as I have heard, to the daughter of Mr. Wilkinson, that wealthy iron-master. To the Thomas and Richard Blakeway, after whom you inquire, I cannot trace any affinity. From Mr. Garbet's MS. History of Wem, I find that the former was eldest son of Robert Blakeway, of that town, glover, Curate of Newtown Chapel in that parish, and of Castle Rising in Norfolk. He died at Sutton, near Yarmouth, in that county, 30 December 1744, in the fiftieth year of his age. Thus Mr. Garbet. The Richard Blakeway, of Corpus, I thought had been the author of an Essay on Religious Melancholy, in the title of which he styles himself Rector of Little Ilford in the county of Essex; but upon recollection (for I have not the book here), I rather think that is a Robert Blakeway, and probably the same person whose letter to Dr. Clarke, 1719, is printed in the Corrigenda to the third volume of the new Biographia, at the head of the fourth volume of that Work.

"Of the Collections for Shropshire by Edward Lloyd, Esq. of Trenewith, near Oswestry, we have several copies. Three I have seen and extracted; and one copy, indeed, I have been promised when a Mr. Chadwicke of Staffordshire, to whom it was

lent, returns it to its owner; which owner, by the way, is a most learned and extraordinary person, not unknown to you, as I percieve by the additions to our county in your Camden-the Rev. Francis Leighton, who once proposed undertaking the work which is the object of my wishes. Mr. Lloyd's Work is a well-digested and handsome volume. At the end of one copy are the heads of an appendix of original records, some of which I should much like to see.

"The terrier of lands in Shropshire is No. 4702 of Mr. Ayscough's printed catalogue of Sloanian MSS. It is there, or in its title, said to be ex dono Smart Lethieullier, arm. With what view it and its fellows (for there are several other counties) were compiled, I have not discovered; but though the names of places and persons are occassionally ill-spelt (a fault into which it is almost impossible to avoid falling, in a transcript of records without local knowledge), I have always found it accurate in substance, when I have compared it with the originals. It was written early in the seventeenth century.

"My hope of Lichfield transcripts is not quite so sanguine as it was. Mr. Mott writes to me with all the kindness I expected; but he says he has laid my letter before his principal, who thinks the permission cannot well be afforded to me, as the same application was made respecting the History of Staffordshire, some time ago, and was refused on account of some seeming inconvenience which might arise from it. Mr. Mott, however, offers me his assistance with this principal, as far as he can consistently with propriety. Who this principal is I have not learnt; but when I next see Mr. Mott, I shall be able to judge better what probability there is of success.

"Will you permit me to remark on your own elaborate and curious pedigree (for I am sure it is not Mr. Shaw's, as I am sorry to say it is almost the only thing worth looking at in his last half volume,) that you have omitted the wife of John Gough with whom you commence. William Wyrcestre relates that Hawys, daughter of Davy Handmere, and wife of Ewen Gough, bailiff of the manor of Hanmere, and nurse of John Earl of Shrewsbury and his brothers and sisters, was mother of the famous soldier, Matthew Gough, Esq. who assisted at the rescue of Caen. Ewen, or Evan, is, as you know, Sir, a Welsh form of the name John.

"I had nearly overlooked your query about Mr. Hotchkis, which I cannot answer positively. I have heard my mother speak of visiting a Mr. Hotchkis in London, brother of our old schoolmaster, Leonard Hotchkis; but I did not understand that he was connected with the Charter-house. I rather think that he lived in College-street, Westminster; and that he had been beneficed in Barbadoes; but whether I fancy this from his being remarkably fond of milk-punch, and because in the vestry at St. Mary's, [Shrewsbury], there is a flat stone to Elizabeth wife