[We have never met with the word, and can only guess at random that it is quasi "the bee-croft," the enclosure where the bees were kept; always remembering that formerly, when honey was an article of large consumption, immense stores of these insects must have been kept. In royal inventories we have "honey casks" enumerated to an immense amount.]
A great Man who could not spell.
—Of what great historical character is it recorded, that though by no means deficient in education, he never could succeed in spelling correctly? I have an impression of having read this in some biography a few years since, and I think it was a great military commander, who always committed this error in his despatches, though a man of acknowledged high talents and well-informed mind, and conscious of this defect, which he had endeavoured in vain to overcome.
SAMPSON ANRAMENII.
[Does our correspondent allude to the Duke of Marlborough, who was avowedly "loose in his cacography" as Lord Duberly has it?]
Glass-making in England.
—The appearance in your pages of several very interesting Notes on the First Paper-mill in England leads me to beg space for a few Queries on another subject of Art-History.
1. When, where, and under what circumstances, was the first manufactory for glass established in England?
2. What writer first notices the introduction or use of glass, in our island?
3. Are there any works of authority published devoted to this material? If so, may I request some of your learned contributors to direct me to them, or, in fact, to any good notice of its early history?