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FUBLIC LIDAI AY

ACTOR, LENOX AND
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS.

rotten wood, yet bears annually moft plentiful crops of a choaky

pear.

THE house itself has little to boast of. I fortunately found it in- HOUSE. capable of being improved into a magnitude exceeding the revenue of the family. It has a hall which I prefer to the rural impropriety of a paltry veftibule; a library thirty feet by eighteen; a parlor capable of containing more guests than I ever wish to fee at a time, Septem, convivium; novem, convicium! and a fmoakingroom moft antiquely furnished with antient carvings, and the horns of all the European beafts of chace. This room is now. quite out of ufe as to its original purpofe. Above stairs is a good drawing-room, in times of old called the dining-room, and a tearoom, the fum of all that are really wanted.-I have Cowley's with realized, a small house and large garden!

LIBRARY.

THE library is filled by a numerous collection of books, principally of hiftory, natural history and claffics. My own labors might fill an ordinary book-room; many of them receive confiderable value from the finaller drawings and prints with. which they are illuftrated on the margins, as well as by the larger intermixed with the leaves; among the latter are feveral drawings of uncommon beauty, by that eminent hand Mr. Nicholas Pococke. Thefe relate either to the Ferroe ifles, or to Iceland, others to the diftant Tibet or Boutan. I was favored, by John. Thomas Stanley, efq. with permiffion to have copies made of the first, and by Warren Haftings, efq. of the laft. Among my own labors, I value myself on my MS. volumes of THE OUTLINES OUTLINES OF THE OF THE GLOBE, in xxii. volumes, folio, on which uncommon expence has been bestowed, in ornament and illuminations.

GLOBE.

IN

HALL.

PORTRAITS.

DAVID PENNANT, WIFE AND

CHILD.

IN the hall are fome very good pictures by Peter Paillou, a fine painter of animals and birds: four exprefs the three climates, two of them are of the Torrid Zone, one the Temperate, and another the Frigid, all illustrated by suitable animals and scenery: the two laft have much merit. Befides, there is a romantic view in Otaheite, and another of part of an ifle of ice near the Antartic Circle, with three different fpecies of those strange birds the pinguins, and two different fpecies of the petrels; this was taken from an original sketch made on the fpot by Doctor John Reinbold Forster.

THE parlor is filled with numbers of portraits, and other paintings. The greater part of the firft are reduced from the originals by Mofes Griffith, in a moft masterly manner. A few excepted, they are family pictures. A very large one covers the end of the room; the figures are three quarters, and dreffed in the manner in which Vandyk did his; the man has a remarkable good look, long hair, whiskers, and fmall beard: his wife is by him; between them a boy with a basket of flowers, and by him a gre-hound. Thefe reprefent David Pennant, fheriff of the county in 1643, his wife Margaret Pennant, of Merton, and their eldeft fon Piers. This piece is done in a fuperior style, a good imitation of Vandyk. A grand column and a rich carpet is introduced, a flattery of the artist, for in those days we were far from being able to pay for even a performance of that value. It probably was done in the troublesome times, when fome painter of merit might have wandered about the country, and have been glad of working for his meat and his drink, and fome trifle for other neceffaries.

My

My great, great grandfather was an officer in the garrison of Denbigh, when it was befieged and taken by my maternal great, great grandfather general Mytton. My loyal ancestor fuffered there a long imprisonment. Bychton was plundered, and the diftrefs of the family fo great, that he was kept from ftarving by force of conjugal affection; for his wife often walked with a bag of oatmeal from the parish of Whiteford to Denbigh to relieve his wants.

NOTWITHSTANDING the zeal of his houfe for the loyal caufe, it fuffered very little in refpect to the general compofition of delinquents; the Bychton eftate only paid 42/. 145. whereas Robert Pennant, of Downing, paid not lefs than 298 7. for his eftate, which was very far inferior to the other. The occafion was this: Robert Pennant had the misfortune to have a hotheaded young fellow in his house, when a fmall detachment of the adverse party, with a cornet at the head, approached the place. He perfuaded the family to refift; the doors were barricadoed, a musquet fired, and the cornet wounded. The house was foon forced, and of course plundered; but, fuch was the moderation of the party, no carnage enfued, and the only revenge seems to have been the difproportionate fine afterwards levied.

NOTWITHSTANDING his brother Hugh is not delivered down to us on canvas, I cannot omit the mention of him as a brave and faithful officer in the royal army ferving in North Wales. He attained the rank of major, and particularly distinguished himself in the isle of Anglesey. In 1648, that island, in imitation of feveral of the English counties, rofe in order to fet the king at liberty, and to restore monarchy to the oppreffed kingdom. Numbers of royalifts reforted to this island from different parts

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MAJOR HUGH
PENNANT,

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