THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
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were in immense quantities, and a few unbroken vessels had been found, with
bones of animals, etc., all imbedded in black earth, found in pits in the gravel
3 or 4 feet deep. A more detailed account would be published in the Essex
Naturalist. (See also Mr. Fitch's address, ante). They were of great
interest, as giving undoubted evidence of the Roman occupation of Maldon. Dr.
Laver described the different kinds of Roman pottery, and said that modern
potters had found it quite impossible to imitate the glaze and colour of the old
Samian ware, of which many examples were shown.
Owing to want of time, Mr. Fitch was able only to give a summary of a paper
he had prepared on "The Ancient Customs and Worthies of Maldon." He
mentioned the custom of Borough-English already referred to, and the first place
among those worthy to be remembered in connection with the town was allotted
to Dr. Thomas Plume, the founder of the library in which the party was
assembled, and a short sketch of whom has already been given. Sir John
Bbamston, Lord Chief Justice of England, and the most celebrated lawyer of
his time, was born in Maldon in 1576, his father being a descendant of William
Bramston, who was Sheriff of London in the reign of Richard II., and his mother
the daughter of Francis Clovill, of an ancient family then residing at West Han-
ningfield Hall, Essex. Sir John presided over the judges who gave the celebrated
judgment against Hampden on the question of "Ship-money." He bought the
manor of Skreens at Roxwell in 1635, the year he was made Lord Chief Justice ;
he died in 1654, and was buried in Roxwell Church, where on a marble stone in
the chancel there is a long Latin inscription to his memory from the pen of the
poet Cowley. John Rogers Herbert, R.A., was born on January 23rd, 1810,
at Maldon, where his father was comptroller of customs. He was a student in
the Royal Academy, but the death of his father obliged him to abandon study
and direct his attention to portraiture, in which he soon attained eminence, and
one of his sitters was the Queen, then Princess Victoria. He was elected R.A.
in 1846, and in 1848 was invited to assist in decorating the new Houses of Par-
liament.
Certain traditions in the town connect Sir Edwin Landseer with it,
even asserting that he was born there, and the Mayor humorously said that out
of a dozen biographers whose works he had consulted, half said that this was the
case, three credited London with the birth of the great painter, and three did not
say that he was born anywhere ! Private enquiry led him to believe that Sir
Edwin was not a native of Maldon, although he spent a great deal of time at his
(the Mayor's) present house, and was often at Beeleigh Grange. Mr. Miller
Christy sent for exhibition a picture reputed to be by Landseer, accompanied
with the following details, which are perhaps of sufficient interest to be given
entire :—
Note on Sir Edwin Landseer.
I find on referring to the chief biographical works which have been published
relating to Landseer, that in very early life he must have had some connection
with Maldon and Chelmsford, though I can discover nothing to show what that
connection was—whether birth, schooling, or otherwise. Probably, if he was not
born in the district, his family had friends or relatives residing here, whom he
used to visit.
Thus his two first exhibited works were local. They were shown at the Royal
Academy in 1815, when he was only thirteen (having been born in 1802), and
were entitled respectively "Portrait of a Mule, the property of W. H. Simpson,