Had he lived to have fulfilled his plans, and with his reason in vigour, this country would, doubtlessly, have possessed topographical works, highly curious, and worthy of his illustrious name, of whom Dibdin thus energetically speaks in his "Bibliomania (p. 321):""No delays," (says he,)" no difficulties, no perils, ever daunted his personal courage, or depressed his mental energies. Enamoured of study to the last rational moment of his existence, Leland seems to have been born for the laborious journey, which he undertook in search of truth, as she was to be discovered among mouldering records, and worm-eaten volumes. Uniting the active talents of a statist with the painful research of an antiquary, he thought nothing too insignificant for observation. The confined streamlet, or the capacious river -the obscure village, or the populous town-were with parchment rolls, and oaken-covered books, alike objects of curiosity to his philosophical eye.'

"rudis

Leland left behind him an immense mass of papers, indigestaque moles." These fell into different hands, and were most serviceable in supplying matter for subsequent authors, amongst whom (with many other antiquaries) were Bale, Camden, Burton, and Dugdale.

His "Itinerary" was published by the industrious Thomas Hearne, the Oxford Antiquary, in nine vols. 8vo., 1710, who also edited a selection of his curious, and learned, collections under the title of " Collectanea," in six vols. 8vo., 1715.

"

The Itinerary," as published by Hearne, is little more than indigested notes, but they must ever charm the man of literature by the union of learning-of accuracy of observation and of modesty, and simplicity, of narrative.

In the Refectory of All Souls' College is a fine bust of this. interesting, and to be lamented, man, of which Dibdin, in the work before alluded to, gives a wood-cut.

NOTE 8-(p. 15.)

"What's in a name?" Although I have professed to have dismissed this subject, yet I feel, that it will not dismiss me without some inquiry into this, not uninteresting, questionwhether the English Nomenclature is, or is not, on the increase? of which I hold decidedly the affirmative opinion. The surname

arose (as we have seen in p. 3) in the eleventh century, and we are now in the nineteenth. In the early period of this long interval surnames were few in number-they are now almost beyond the power of enumeration. Few, however, as they then were, most of those are now no more. I shall illustrate this note by reference to family names of the County of Wilts. Many parishes and hamlets, from local causes, having originally the same names as other parishes and hamlets in that county, the name of the principal family has been superadded to the one for the purpose of contradistinction from that of the other. Thus have we the vills of Littleton Pagnal, (or Paganal,) Stanton Fitz Warine, Stanton St. Quintin, Draycot Cerne, Lediard Tregooze, Newtown Tony, Fisherton Aucher, (corruptedly Anger), Fisherton Delamere, Manningford Brewse, Manningford Bohun, Norton Bavant, Winterborne Gunner, Teffont Ewias, Somerford Manduit, Chilton Foliot, Sutton Mandeville, Sutton Benger, and Yatton Keynall; but where are now the families, and the names, of Pagnal, Fitzwarine, St. Quintin, Cerne, Tregooze, Tony, Aucher, De la Mere, Brewse, Bohun, Bavant, Gunner, Ewias, Foliot, Mandeville, Benger, and Keynall?— they are gone!-and "the places thereof know them no more!"-and, may I not add, "non stat nominis umbra?"

To these I may well join others, some of them coeval with the above, and some of later date. Let me mention the family names of Tocotes, Walrand, Mompesson, Servington, Bonham, Stradling, Tropenell, Sturmy, Gawen, Collingbourne, Knyvett, Mervyn, Danvers, Pavely, Bokland, Rawleigh, Tooker, Woodhull, Mawarden, Hargill, Turberville, Zouch, Puddesey, Wadham, Stumpe, Bodenham, Evelyn, Stanter, Fitz-John, and Dunch. I could greatly add to this list of, probably, extinct names, but these will suffice for my purpose. I must observe, that, in modern days, the names of Erneley, Freke, and Hungerford, have vanished from this world's stage. The latter named family (that of Hungerford) was widely spread in numerous branches through the land, insomuch that, as Aubrey, the Wiltshire Antiquary saith, "Hungerford's coate in this county is a kind of parietaria,† that flourishes on every wall; so great possessions have they here, (alias, anciently had,)

• Wilts.

+"Parietaria." The plant named "Pellitory of the Wall."—E. D.

whose tenants # sett up their coates honoris ergo, and a great deal yet enjoy." Aubrey is here speaking of the Church of Crudwell, in the windows of which are (or were in his time) the arms of Hungerford, and he thus alludes to the frequency of their appearance on the walls, or in the windows, of that, and other Churches in Wilts. Yet where is now the posterity (at least in the male line) of this ancient, and numerous—affluent, and powerful family to be found? Alas! the scythe of time has passed over them- they are mown-they are witheredthey are gone!

On the origin of the surname its use was nearly limited to the Lord of the parochial town, or vill, as Edwardus de Sarisberie, Giraldus de Wiltune, Ricardus de Darneford. How widely different is this from the almost indefinite list of names, which now pervade the land! and yet (with a constant, and simultaneous, extinction of appellatives) we have arrived at this countless multitude. It is now eight centuries, since the origin of the surname in this country; and, were it possible, that we could have the nomenclature of the land laid before us exactly as it stood at the close of each century, we should, at once, clearly perceive (notwithstanding the great, and constant, decay of names) the truth of my position-that they are in the invariable progression of a great increase.

The question will here be fairly asked of me--how do you account for this increase? This is a question far easier to be asked than to be answered; and, I fear, we must be content with the obvious knowledge of the fact. Some names spring up from the corruption of orthography, or of pronunciation. Some originate from the influx of foreigners caused by royal marriages -by refuge from prosecutions, or persecutions-by expatriations arising from revolutions-by the settlement of alien manufacturers—and the names of many of these have often been altered, and anglicised, and their posterity have, in the bearers thereof, become as genuine Englishmen. At other times fictitious names have started up, and been perpetuated, doubtlessly, within our own country from their adoption in the removal from one part of the kingdom to another by the criminal, and by the insolvent. Another increment of names arises, perhaps, from the occasional settlement here of Americans, and West Indians; for it is a

"Tenants," i. e. (in this place) landholders, or owners of land.-E. D.

certain, and curious, fact, that, although America was, originally, peopled from this country, yet it varies very essentially in its nomenclature from that of England. In fact many other causes, impossible even to guess, unknown, and invisible, yet certain in effect, are, I well believe, in constant operation for the production, and obvious increase, of names; which, in the fluctuating state of this nether world, is one of the very few things, which, I should pronounce, has not—a ne plus ultra !

NOTES TO ESSAY II.

NOTE 1-(p. 19.)

"" By this short genealogy it will be seen, that the name of that family" (Halle)" became extinct by the marriage of Joan, the heiress of William, the only son of John Halle with Sir Thomas Wriothesley, Garter principal King of Arms."

This family, in its more early times, bore the name of Wroth, or Wryth, which was, subsequently, enlarged to Wriothesley. They were, first, eminent heralds, and, afterwards, eminent statesmen. Sir John Wroth, Wryth, or Wriothesley, Kt., was Garter principal King of Arms. As the chief heraldic officer at the time of the establishment of the Heralds' College, in him was vested, by Richard, the Third, the building appropriated for that purpose, which had been the mansion of Henry Holland, Duke of Exeter, and which was denominated by Stow, in his "Survey of London," "a right faire and stately house." He was regarded as the founder of the Heralds' College, and his arms were adopted as those of the Society. A very curious illuminated portrait is given of him in Dallaway's "Origin and Progress of Heraldry," p. 134. He is there represented in his heraldic costume, and mounted on a horse gaily caparisoned. This plate was copied from a tournament roll in the Heralds' College.

Sir John Wriothesley had two sons-Sir Thomas, who married Joan, the representative of the family of Halle, and who, also, was raised to the heraldic dignity of Garter principal King of Arms-and William, who was made York Herald. Sir Thomas

died without issue, but his brother, William, left a son, Thomas, who, after arriving at many honourable employments, was, in the 35th year of Henry, the Eighth, ennobled under the title of Lord Southampton of Tichfield, in the County of Southampton; and, in the following year, he was made the Lord Chancellor, and, subsequently, Earl of Southampton. It is unnecessary, for the purposes of this note, to pursue the genealogy of this family further. Let it suffice to say, that Rachel, the co-heiress of the fourth, and last, Lord, married, for her second husband, the celebrated patriot, Lord William Russell. The house of Bedford, consequently, now quarters the arms of Wriothesley; and, in remembrance of the alliance, that name is usually borne by some one of the family.

I know not, whether it can be proved; but I suspect, that Sir John Wriothesley, Garter King of Arms, sprang, collaterally, from the ancient family of Wroth, which inherited, and resided on, the manor of Durants, in the parish of Enfield, for upwards of three centuries. The pedigree of this family is given in Lysons's "Environs of London." The same family, also, in an early age, possessed the manor, and estate, of Barford, in the parish of Downton, Wilts.

NOTE 2-(p. 22.)

"Si Thomas Halle sit tertius serviens attendens maioriThe subject of this note will, I fear, be regarded as trivialtoo unimportant to call for special observations, and too barren in itself to excite interest. The Latin Participle "serviens" is, manifestly, the origin of the English Word "servant;" and, without doubt, also, that of "Serjeant," or "Sergeant." The latter words are merely formed by the interchange of a letter, or two. The question is here debated, whether Thomas Halle should be (elected) the third Sergeant (or servant) attendant on the Mayor. The word Serjeant, or Sergeant, varies somewhat in its meaning, and is applied to different parties, generally in a ministerial situation, such as the Sergeant-at-Mace, or the Mace-bearer of a Corporation-the regimental Sergeant-the Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Lords, and of the House of Commons-all these denote offices of a lower, or higher, service -bound to obey official commands, and, perhaps, their offices,