J. M. B.
[Ask that staunch and sturdy royalist, Peter Heylin, whether Old Tom is not sometimes more facetious than correct; and whether, in the extract given above, we should not read Richard I. for Edward I. In Knyghton's Chronicle, lib. II. cap. viii. sub Hen. I., we find, "Mercatorum falsam ulnam castigavit adhibita brachii sui mensura." See also William of Malmsbury in Vita Hen. I., and Spelm. Hen. I. apud Wilkins, 299., who inform us, that a new standard of longitudinal measure was ascertained by Henry I., who commanded that the ulna, or ancient ell, which answers to the modern yard, should be made of the exact length of his own arm.]
Elstob, Elizabeth.—Can any of your numerous correspondents state where that celebrated Saxon linguist, Mrs. Elizabeth Elstob, was buried? In Chambers's Biographical Illustrations of Worcestershire, she is said to have been buried at Saint Margaret's, Westminster; but after every inquiry, made many years since of the then worthy churchwarden of the parish, our researches were in vain, for there is no account of her sepulture in the church or graveyard.
J. B. Whitbourne.
[Most of the biographical notices of Mrs. Elizabeth Elstob state that she was buried at St. Margaret's, Westminster. We can only account for the name not appearing in the register of that church, from her having changed her name when she opened her school in Worcestershire, as stated, on the authority of Mr. Geo. Ballard, in Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, vol. iv. p. 714. Ballard's Correspondence is in the Bodleian.]
Monumental Brasses in London.—Can any of your correspondents favour me with a list of churches in London, or within a mile of the same, containing monumental brasses? I know of St. Helen's, Bishopsgate, only.
J. W. Brown.
[As our young crypto-antiquary dates his letter from Crosby Hall, he will probably find in its library the following works to assist him in his researches:—List of Monumental Brasses in England (Rivington), Manual for the Study of Monumental Brasses (Parker), and Sperling's Church Walks in Middlesex (Masters). Two are noticed in Waller's Monumental Brasses, fol., 1842, viz. Dr. Christopher Urswick, in Hackney Church, A.D. 1521, and Andrew Evyngar and wife, in All-Hallows Barking Church. If we mistake not, there is one in St. Faith's, near St. Paul's.]