and Commonalty aforesaid, on Saturday next after the Feast of Saint Valentine,’--February the 14th,--‘in the seventeenth Year of the reign of King Edward the son of King Edward.--We have also granted and confirmed the ordinances, agreements, contracts, and grants aforesaid, and all other things contained in the aforesaid writing, having established and acknowledged them for us and our heirs, so much as in us lies, as the aforesaid writing may fairly witness. In testimony of which, &c. Witness the King, at the Tower of London, the 16th day of June. For a fine of ten marks:’--that is to say the sum of £6. 13_s._ 4_d._ “Before entering upon the tumultuous reign of Richard II. I must observe to you, Mr. Barbican, that in the Patent Roll for the 42nd of Edward III.--1368,--Membrane 21, there is a sort of memorandum of a transfer of a piece of ground from the Friars Minors for the support of London Bridge, the title of which is couched in the following terms: ‘The Guardians of the Friars Minors of London remit for ever to the Mayor, &c. of London, one portion of land on the Southern side of the Church within Newgate, in London, for the support of the Bridge at London, they giving for the same, to the Abbot of Westminster, the sum of four shillings, the which is contained in divers covenants: the King hath confirmed it.’ “Well!” said I to Mr. Postern, on his conclusion of these Patents, “this succession of your dull and never-ending Charters would weary the patience of the most phlegmatic Dutch Lawyer that ever studied at Leyden. Come there any more of them, my honest friend? or may we yet look out for land, after so long tossing in the wide sea of the Tower Records?” “Tranquillise your perturbed feelings, my good Sir,” replied Mr. Barnaby, “for we are now drawing very rapidly towards that time, when we can give only mere facts, and descriptive scenes of history, unsupported by any of those curious and unquestionable proofs which these evidences furnish. Not but that there are, doubtless, yet many scores of most interesting papers and Charters concerning this Bridge, preserved in the Close Rolls, the ‘_Rotuli Chartarum_,’ the Patent Rolls, and the vast body of the Records of this kingdom: but life is too short, and the search would be too long, to discover them all; though I would, for your sake, that I knew them better, and could delight your ears with their recital.” “God forbid! Mr. Postern,” ejaculated I, “that you should bestow all your tediousness upon me! for truly, from that which you have recited, I have some conception of what the whole must be; and I would rather entreat you now to pass on to some of those same ‘facts, and descriptive scenes of history,’ which you seem to undervalue so much, because they do not drag a wearisome Patent Roll after them. Therefore once more, Master Barnaby, I say, give me a tale.”