the Epigrams, &c., &c., in Elegant Extracts, in the edition bearing date 1805, under the title of a Rhapsody.
West Sussex.
Roman Roads in England (Vol. ix., p. 325.).—I think that in addition to the reference to Richard of Cirencester, Prestoniensis should be apprised of the late General Roy's Military Antiquities of Great Britain (published by the Society of Antiquaries), a most learned and valuable account of and commentary on Richard de Cirencester, and on all the other works on the subject; Stukeley, Horsley, &c. I have my own doubts as to the genuineness of Richard's work; that is, though I admit that the facts are true, and compiled with accuracy and learning, I cannot quite persuade myself that the work is that of the Monk of Westminster in the fourteenth century, never heard of till the discovery of an unique MS. in the Royal Library at Copenhagen about 1757. I suspect it to have been a much more modern compilation.
C.
Anecdote of George IV. (Vol. ix., pp. 244. 338.)—If Julia R. Bockett has accurately copied (as we must presume) the note that she has sent you, I am sorry to inform her that it is a forgery: the Prince never, from his earliest youth, signed "George" tout court; he always added P. If the story be at all true, your second correspondent, W. H., is assuredly right, that the "old woman" could not mean the Queen, who was but eighteen when the Prince was born, and could not, therefore, at any time within which this note could have been written, be called, even by the giddiest boy, "an old woman." When the Prince was twelve years old, she was but thirty.
C.
General Fraser (Vol. ix., p. 161.).—The communication of J. C. B. contains the following sentence:
"During his interment, the incessant cannonade of the enemy covered with dust the chaplain and the officers who assisted in performing the last duties to his remains, they being within view of the greatest part of both armies."
As some might suppose from this that the American army was guilty of the infamous action of knowingly firing upon a funeral, the following extract from Lossing's Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution, lately published, is submitted to the readers of "N. & Q." It tells the whole truth upon the subject. It is from vol. i. p. 66.:
"It was just sunset in that calm October evening, that the corpse of General Fraser was carried up the hill to the place of burial within the 'great redoubt.' It was attended only by the members of his military family, and Mr. Brudenel, the chaplain; yet the eyes of hundreds of both armies followed the solemn procession, while the Americans, ignorant of its true character, kept up a constant cannonade upon the redoubt. The chaplain, unmoved by the danger to which he was exposed, as the cannon-balls that struck the hill threw the loose soil over him, pronounced the impressive funeral service of the Church of England with an unfaltering voice.[[2]] The growing darkness added solemnity to the scene. Suddenly the irregular firing ceased, and the solemn voice of a single cannon, at measured intervals, boomed along the valley and awakened the responses of the hills. It was a minute gun, fired by the Americans in honour of the gallant dead. The moment information was given that the gathering at the redoubt was a funeral company fulfilling, amid imminent perils, the last breathed wishes of the noble Fraser, orders were issued to withhold the cannonade with balls, and to render military homage to the fallen brave."