My dear Bea, No doubt this extract is what Carlyle went upon. Oliver Cromwell’s - or the Commonwealth Great Seal as figured by Knight has the map of England and Ireland on one side, and (apparently) parliament sitting on the reverse. The authority for it is not given. Rapin’s history however says that Richard had a new Great seal made for himself, and this must be the thing that was hidden, as it was an awkward ... continue reading

My dear Edmund Thank you for the result of your audacious bit of sacrilege, and also Mr Hardy. Mr Bowland’s epitaph, I am glad he was a keeper of the parks and not of the swine! Duthy read the name Bockland and Marsh Bowland He must have been a man in good odour with employers and tenants I wonder whether his eulogy is the work of a Bishop’s Chaplain or a ... continue reading