[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTLTOR."]
Silt,—In the article entitled "The Foreign Office and Portu- guese Slavery," in your issue of Saturday, March 8th, there occurs the following passage, viz.: " The true answer to all such madmen is to tell them straight out, in the words of the assembled Barons at Clarendon, slightly altered : Nolumus foedera Angliae inutari." May I venture to suggest to you that it was not at Clarendon, but at Merton, that the words which you adapted were used by the Barons P A reference to " Ruffhead's Statutes " will, I think, bear this out. See the edition of 1763, vol. i., p. 19, the Statute of Merton, 20 Henry III., and chapter 9, in which the following passage occurs (I give it in the spelling of the text in " Ruffhead ") :-
" Ac rogaverunt omnes Episcopi Magnates ut consentirent quod nati ante matrimonium essent legitimi, sicut illi qui nati sunt post matrimonium, quantum ad successionem hereditariam, quia Ecclesia tales habet pro legitimis. Et omnes Comites et Barones nun voce responderunt quod nolunt leges Anglin mutare quae usitate sunt et approbate."
The Athenaeum, Pall Mall, S. W.
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