I flattered myself, that I might have had it in my power to have enriched this work by some valuable communications from the British Museum. Although, through the good offices of the Earl of Aberdeen, one of the trustees of this national repository, search has been made, nothing of importance has been discovered in regard to this period of our history. Henry Ellis, Esq. of the Museum, who, in the most obliging manner, offered every assistance in his power, has in a letter addressed to his Lordship, furnished two extracts from MSS., which have a claim to attention, at least as matters of curiosity. I shall take the liberty of communicating them in his own language:—
“I find nothing in the King’s, the Cottonian, or the Harleian Collections; but among the Donation Manuscripts, No. 4934, (in the first volume of Francis Peck’s Collections for a Supplement to Dugdale’s Monasticon), is a transcript of ‘Prioris Alnwicensis de Bello Scotico apud Dumbarr, tempore Regis Edwardi I. Dictamen, sive Rithmus Latinus quo de Willielmo Wallace, Scotico illo Robin Whood, plura, sed invidiose, canit.’ It is somewhat in the manner of Walter de Mapes, as your Lordship will perceive by the following specimens; and consists of sixty stanzas.
1.
‘Ludere volentibus ludens paro Liram,
De Mundi malitia Rem demonstro miram;
Nil quod nocet, refero; Rem gestam requiram:
Scribo novam Satiram, set sic ne seminet Iram.
}
Morus.
46.
Falsus Dux Fallacie convocavit Cetum,
(Sciensque abierit Rex noster trans Fretum)
Cremare Northumbriam statuit Decretum:
Sepe videmus, ait, post Gaudia rumpere Fletum.
}