We are not yet quite right about the first panorama, but perhaps the following will close the discussion.
I have lately been sitting with Mr. Barker (ætat 78), and he tells me that, when quite a boy, he sketched for his father the view of Edinburgh from the observatory on the Calton Hill: in the foreground was Holyrood House; that that was a half circle, and was exhibited in Edinburgh.
So much was thought of the discovery of its being possible to take a view beyond the old rule of sixty degrees, that they went to London, and then he took the view from the top of the Albion Mills, as was stated in Vol. iv., p. 54.
That was three quarters of a circle, and was exhibited in Castle Street, Leicester Square. Afterwards the whole circle was attempted. The idea of painting a view more than sixty degrees, was suggested by his mother. His father did not work at them, he being a portrait painter; but he did, young as he was. Mr. Robert Barker and his wife were both Irish; but Henry Aston the son was born in Glasgow.
H. T. ELLACOMBE.
Clyst St. George.
JOHN A KENT.
(Vol. iv., p. 83.)
As I have not seen the Athenæum, I send the following notes, in uncertainty whether or not they may prove acceptable to MR. COLLIER.
Sion y Cent, i.e. John a Kent, or John of Kentchurch, is very generally believed in Wales to have been Owen Glendowr; though some few—unable to account for the mysterious disappearance of the hero—are still firmly convinced that he sleeps, like Montezuma and various other mighty men, in some deep cavern, surrounded by his warriors, until the wrongs of his country shall call him forth once more to lead them on to battle.
The following extracts are from notes appended [by the editors] to some poems of John a Kent which are published amongst the "Iolo MSS." by the "Welsh MSS. Society."