"'After my very harty commendations, I doe take this manner of proceeding by the Regent Masters (for their sitting covered at Congregations and Convocations) in soe good part, that although I might well take some time to advise before I give answer, especially when I consider how long that custom hath continued, how much it hath been questioned, and that upon a long debate it hath been withstood by so grave and wise a Counsellor of State as your late Chancellor, my immediate predecessor; yet, when I weigh their undoubted right, their discreet and orderly proceedings to seek it, not to take it, the chief, if not the only, cause why it was formerly denied; the good congruity this doth beare, not with Cambridge alone (though that were motive enough), but all other places, it being no where seen that those that are admitted Judges are required to sit bare-headed; I cannot choose but commend and thus farre yield to theire request as to referre it to the Convocation House. I hope no man can have cause to think that I have not the power to continew this custom as well as some others of my predecessors, if I had a mind to strive; nor that I seek after their applause in yielding them that now, which hath been so long kept from them, but the respect I have to their due, to the decency of the place, and honour of the University, which I cannot conceive to bee anyway diminished, but rather increased, by their sitting covered, are the only reasons that have moved me, and carried me to so quick a resolution, wherewith you may acquaint the Convocation House with this also, that what they shall conclude I shall willingly agree to. And soe I doe very hartely take leave, and rest

Your assured loving friend,

Pembrooke.

Baynard's Castle,

this 4 of December, 1620.'

Which letter being publickly read in a Convocation held 20 Dec., it was then agreed upon by the consent of all there present, that all Masters of what condition soever might put on their caps in Congregations and Convocations, yet with these conditions: That in the said assemblies the said Masters should use only square caps, and not sit bare, or without cap. And if any were found faulty in these matters, or that they should bring their hats in the said Assemblies, they should not only lose their suffrages for that time, but be punished as the Vicechancellor should think fit. Lastly, it was decreed, under the said conditions and no otherwise, that in the next Congregation in the beginning of Hilary Term, and so for ever after, all Masters, of what condition soever, whether Regents or not Regents, should, in Congregations and Convocations, put on and use square caps.

"All that shall be said more of this matter is, that the loss of using caps arose from the negligence of the Masters, who, to avoid the pains of bringing their caps with them, would sit bare-headed; which being used by some, was at length followed by all, and so at length became a custom."

It would seem, from Lord Pembroke's letter, that the right of the senate of this university to wear their caps had not been questioned.

C. H. Cooper.

Cambridge.

RUSSIA, TURKEY, AND THE BLACK SEA.

(Vol. ix., p. 103.)

Statements and complaints have often been made respecting the imperfect knowledge possessed by English navigators of the shores and coasts of the Black Sea, and of the great danger thence arising to ships and fleets from England, which would thus seem to be without the charts necessary for their guidance. The Guardian newspaper reiterates these complaints in its number for Jan. 11. This deficiency of charts, however, ought not to exist, and probably does not; since, no doubt, the English and French Governments would take care to supply them at the present time. As respects England, Dr. E. D. Clarke, in his well-known Travels in Russia, &c. (see vol. i. 4th edit., 8vo., London, 1816, Preface, p. x.), states that he brought—

"Certain documents with him from Odessa, at the hazard of his life, and deposited within a British Admiralty."