THE CHRONICLES OF ENGLAND.

THIS book was first translated from a French Chronicle (MSS. Harl. 200, 4to.) written in the beginning of the reign of Edward III. The French have also a famous ancient prose Romance, called Brut, which includes the history of the Sangreal; but I know not whether this is the same with the English copy.

These Chronicles were printed by Caxton, in 1480, in the 20th of Edward IV. They were also printed, together with the "Fruit of Times," in a thick short folio, in 1483, at St. Albans. Hence they have been called the Book of St. Albans, and the Chronicle of St. Albans. In this edition, which was re-printed by Wynkin de Worde, in 1497, the names of the authors, from whom it was chiefly compiled, are enumerated; viz. " 1. Galfridus Monmouth, monk, in his book of Brute; 2. S. Bede, in the Acts of England, in his book of Times; 3. Gildas, in the Acts of Britain; 4. William of Malmsbury, monk; in the Acts of the Kings of England and Bishops; 5. Cassiodorus, of the Acts of Emperors and Bishops;

6. St. Austin de Civitate Dei; 7. Titus Livius de Gestis Romanorum; 8. Martin, penitentiary to the pope, in his Chronicles of Empe rors and Bishops; 9. and lastly, Theobaldus Cartusiensis, containing in his book the progress of all notable fathers, from the beginning of the world unto our time, with the notable acts of the same."

This work is divided into seven parts; of which the last makes half the book, and begins at the conquest. In the prologue, the au thor proposes to continue these Chronicles, "from the Normans to our time, which is under the reign of king Edward IV. the 23d year, whose noble Chronicles, by custom, may not be seen." The writer, however, was probably prevented by death, from completing his design: for at the end of his Chronicle, he does not descend so low by nearly a dozen years; and the last paragraph ends with the popedom of Sixtus IV. who was elected in 1471, and was still living, "At the making of this book," which concludes by saying, "that John Abbot, of Habingdon, was the pope's le gate in England, to dispose of the treasure of the church, to withstand the misbelieveable Turk," &c.

The book first mentioned, printed by Caxton, is likewise divided into seven parts; and also into 263 chapters. The last, or 263d, treats" Of the Deposition of king Henry VI. and how king Edward IV. took possession of the realm; and of the battle on Palm-Sunday; and how he was wounded."

The Chronicles, as printed by Caxton, were common before the introduction of printing. In those times of popery, no English Chronicle was so generally read; nor any, for above 150 years after, so often reprinted; amounting in the whole, to five or six impressions, in the space of thirty years. To the latter editions is annexed, "The Description of England," taken from the Polychronicon. Pynson's edition concludes with a short Latin epilogue, briefly enumerating the kings of England from the conquest.

As the fabulous history of Britain may not be familiar to all my readers, it may be entertaining to such persons, to know who were its aboriginal inhabitants, according to the account, and in the language of these early Chronicles. I shall therefore lay before the reader, the story of the first peopling of our island, together with the legend of Brute, entire. But previ

ous to this, it may be proper to premise, that the story of Brute and his Trojans, is taken from Geoffrey of Monmouth; and for the bes nefit of the uninformed reader, to give a brief statement of the origin of this romantic fable, with others contained in that ancient historian.

About the year 1100, Walter Mapes, archdeacon of Oxford, in his travels through France, procured in Armorica, or Bretagne, an ancient chronicle, entitled Brut-y-Brenhined; i. e. the History of the Kings of Britain. On his return to England, he communicated the MS. to Geoffrey of Monmouth, a Welch benedictine monk, with a request that he would translate it into Latin. In this translation, Geoffrey has interwoven various traditions from the testimony of his friend, the archdeacon, who learnt them in Armorica; and also has probably added others known to himself, as popular in Wales. In particular, some part of the account of king Arthur's atchievements, he acknowledges to have received from the mouth of Walter; and confesses that Merlin's prophecies were not in the Armorican original. Geoffrey's translation was probably finished after the year 1188.

Mr. Warton supposes that the British ori

ginal consisted of fables thrown out by different rhapsodists, at different times, whichwere afterwards collected and digested into an entire history, perhaps with new decorations of fancy by the compiler, whom he conjectures to have been one of the professed bards, or rather, a poetical historian of Armorica, or Basse Bretagne; and that in this state it fell into the hands of Geoffrey of Monmouth. This Chronicle, divested of its romantic embellishments, deduces the Welch princes from the Trojan Brutus to Cadwallader, who reigned in the seventh century.

It is remarkable, that this humour of tracing their descent from Troy, prevailed from the sixth and seventh centuries downwards, among most of the European nations. Hunnibaldus Francus, in his Latin history of France, beginning with the Trojan war, and ending with Clovis the First, ascribes the origin of the French nation to Francio, a son of Priam. And even the Greeks did not escape the preposterous ambition of being thought to be descended from their ancient and notorious enemies. This absurd emulation, among the European nations, for the honour of a Trojan alliance, is supposed by Warton, to have originated from the revival of Virgil's Æneid, about

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