half the length, in which state it was dug up in the year 1823 in the street, outside the churchyard of All Saints, Northampton, at the south-east corner of it, part of it before having been above ground as a spur-stone, but in such a position as not to exhibit the inscription. We are indebted for the account of it, as also for the plate from which the accompanying delineation is engraved, to a most ably edited Guide of Northampton, now publishing in parts by Mr. G. N. Wetton of that town, in which, however, an explanation of the inscription or a restoration of it are not given. The characters, which are capitals, might correspond to such as were used in the 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, or 15th centuries, but they probably belong to the 12th or 13th. The two lines are the ends of an hexameter and pentameter verse, and the solution seems to be that they were penned by some monk or scholastic person to mark the spot where the Danes or Northumbrians in some former age were repulsed in an attack on Northampton. The following restoration of the lines may be proposed : (Hic locus est iste incurs)u quo corruit hostis (Quo cùm certaret vin)cere victus erat. The correctness of the above restoration can scarcely be doubted from the following reasons: first, as having in the first line the terminating letter of a preceding noun, a relative pronoun, and the concluding clause of the first sentence; and, secondly, there being an evident antithesis in the second line, of which the last three words plainly furnish us with the purport. The intelligent author of the Northampton Guide informs us (p. 3) that the Danes held Northampton from 917 to 921. In 1010 (p. 4) they took possession of the town, burnt it, and desolated the country. In 1064 the Northumbrians held the place for a short time. It is also recorded that King Henry the Sixth was defeated in a great battle by the Yorkists in A. D. 1460, near Northampton. It is necessary to add in elucidation of the engraving that the stone, when adopted for a spur-stone, seems to have been chiselled and trimmed at the top, so that it does not shew the line of fracture of the upper part. Yours, &c. B. P. CEREVICT VSER AT WILLIAM BROWNE, THE AUTHOR OF "BRITANNIA'S PASTORALS." AT the foot of the range of the Dartmoor Hills lies the neat little town of Tavistock. In its immediate neighbourhood is some of the most lovely and most varied scenery of England. A few miles to the west the Tamar sleeps, like a silver snake, beneath the picturesque bridge of Gresson, dividing the fat meads of Devon from Cornwall's sorry soil. To the south, on either side of the Plymouth road, are tin and copper mines of vast extent; on the left of the road is a strange-looking hamlet. And there, by disembowell'd hills, Overlooking the country for thirty miles or so on every side stand the rugged heights of Dartmoor; their summits display a sort of natural Stonehenge of vast isolated blocks, and are the favourite haunt of clouds and thunder storms. Amidst these romantic scenes the author of the "Britannia's Pastorals" first saw the light; and from them he received the poet's education during his childhood and his early youth. He was born in 1590, and went to Oxford University at the usual age, which at that time was much earlier than it is at present. At Oxford he became a good classic. From thence he removed to the Inner Tem ple, purposing to become a member of the law; but the sweet memories of his youthful haunts intruded themselves upon his heart. In his twenty third year the first part of "Britannia's Pastorals came out, and proved by its great extent, and bright springmorning spirit how little its author was inclined or calculated for the studies he had chosen. From the eulogiums which are prefixed to the subsequent editions of Browne's poem, it appears that it pro cured him the esteem and friendship of some of the foremost minds of the time, Selden, Drayton, Ben Jonson, and George Wither being of the number. In the following year his reputation was extended by the publication of "The Shepherd's Pipe," which had been written in conjunction with the last-named poet, with whom he had formed an intimate friendship, and in whose writings he is mentioned as who needed support or encouragement, though unknown, if fairly recommended to him, he was very liberal." The poet was received into the family of this nobleman, by whose friendship he profited so much that he was enabled, subsequently, to purchase an that gentle swaine Who wonnes by Tavy, on the westerne plaine. About the year 1615 William Browne returned to Exeter College, in the capacity of tutor to Robert Dormer, Earl of Caernarvon, and "while guiding the studies of this nobleman," writes Chalmers, "Browne was created Master of Arts, with this honourable notice in the public register:- Vir omni humana literatura et bonarum artium cognitione instructus.' 999 The second part of "Britannia's Pastorals" appeared in 1616, and a reprint of the complete poem came out in 1625. After leaving the university Browne was patronized by William Earl of Pembroke, of whom Clarendon writes: "As his conversation was most with men of the most pregnant parts and understanding, so toward any such GENT. MAG. VOL. XXIX. estate. These few facts are almost all that has reached us of his history; the time of his death is not precisely known; nor has posterity been made acquainted with more of his character and personal appearance than is conveyed by the concise description of Wood, who tells us that "as he had a little body, so a great mind." Since the death of William Browne, there have been two or three reprints of the "Britannia's Pastorals," the last 2 K being a very cheap one, by H. G. Clarke, in 1844. A few years ago Sir Egerton Brydges edited a small collection of Browne's minor poems, from MSS. in the British Museum. "The fame of Browne," writes his noble and accomplished editor, "which his known works never seemed to me to authorize, has been partly founded on the smaller poems now recovered from oblivion. I will not hesitate to say that I far prefer these latter to his more laboured compositions, which he gave to the world as the formal efforts on which he chose to rest his honours . . . . There is a simplicity, a chasteness, a grace, a facility, a sweetness in some of the present short poems, which to me is full of attraction and delight; and is the more surprising when it is contrasted with the corrupt and absurdly metaphysical style of most of Browne's cotemporaries." Although the praises bestowed upon the minor poems by their editor are not wholly unmerited, we are still far from agreeing in what seems to be the opinion of Sir Egerton Brydges, that the fame of William Browne is justified by these effusions. If we mistake not, a considerable portion of the renown which is now attached to the names of several of the poets of the seventeenth century, and, among others, to that of Browne, is owing to the extravagant eulogiums which it was the fashion of the literary men of that age to pass upon each other. The truth is, that Browne, like Herrick, has no right to a place upon the book-shelves of any but those who make English poetry a particular study. The general reader, who has but three-score years and ten to do everything in, ought to have no time to peruse such a poem as the "Britannia's Pastorals." Another cause which has operated strongly in conferring an excessive fame upon some of the old poets, is the custom that was introduced by Charles Lamb and his school, and which still prevails among "retrospective reviewers," of putting forth, in extracts, all the best, and perhaps the only worthy passages in the writings of a poet, without sufficiently warning their readers against accepting such quotations for fair average specimens. The chief merit of the "Britannia's Pastorals" consists in the impress which they bear upon them of a kind and pure, though somewhat weak and unformed, mind. This poem, which is longer than Paradise Lost, seems to have been constructed upon no distinct and consistent plan. The incidents form an incoherent tissue of improbabilities, generally void of any allegorical meaning by which they can be justified. Browne seems to have become sensible of this defect before the completion of his poem, and to have laboured to diminish it, in the latter portion, by the introduction of some allegories, in the style of Spenser ; but they are, for the most part, obscure, weak, and insufficient. Nor are these the only faults of this attempted amendment, for the poem has thus been rendered heterogeneous; the promise made by the poet in the beginning, My muse for lofty pitches shall not roam, But homely pipen of her native home, having been kept throughout the early portions, and neglected in the subsequent ones. Browne knew his forte when he made this ill-kept promise. However im probable the incidents, his illustrations of them are generally pleasing, as long as they speak of country-life; of the shepherd who with his lass Sweetly environ'd with the daisied downs; The shag-hair'd satyrs, and the tripping fauns, Upon such topics the muse of Browne was sweet, natural, and sufficient, as the quotations which we now proceed to make will shew. Here is a truthful description of "the muse's friend, grey-eyed Aurora :"- The day more advanced is equally finely depicted :- We do not like the practice of attaching primary importance to individual phrases and epithets in poetry, but we cannot help calling the reader's attention to such forcible and original expressions as the "strong-neck'd ox," the horse's "buttocks broad," the "swart ploughman," the "deepmouth'd hound," and "grey-eyed Aurora." Milton thought some of these touches worth imitating or appropriating. Here are two companion pieces to the above : All things were hush'd, each bird slept on his bough; Clamour grew dumb; unheard was shepherd's song, And all the upper world lay in a trance, Only the curling streams soft chidings kept ; Dry summer's dust, in fearful whisperings stirr'd, No less to our liking is the following SQUIRREL HUNT. Then as a nimble squirrel from the wood Sits partly on a bough, his brown nuts cracking, And from the shell the sweet white kernel taking, With sticks and stones and many a sounding hollo, And here is the picture of a picture which is in the best style of ancient landscape painters: And as within a landscape that doth stand, Wrought by the pencil of some curious hand, How enchanting is the effect of this simple enumeration of natural objects! What breadth and dignity is there in some of the touches! How delicate is the appreciation of the beauties of a hilly country like Devonshire which is shewn in the phrase Some high-raised land, In pride bears out her breasts unto the strand. And we may here observe how thoroughly Browne felt the characteristic loveliness of his lovely native county. A long string of passages, each different to the other in its beauty, might be quoted describing hills alone. In one place we have Two hills, the highest Phoebus sees, In another place we hear of Summer When the hot dog-star rains his maladies, |