Thus much we have to say concerning our author’s life and works. But let us reflect on what Dr. Nicolson says, in reciting what he had wrote of the Saxon history; adding, _but it seems, he treated too of much higher times_. Here he must at least mean his British history, or that from the time of the Romans; and perhaps that description of Roman Britain, which we are now treating off: but what reasons were suggested to him about it, we cannot guess; and in our manuscript we observe it begins with p. xxii. as appears from a scrip I desired my friend Bertram to send me, of the manner of the writing: therefore some other work of our Richard’s was probably contained in those 22 pages. However these matters may have been, we must justly admire our author’s great capacity, in compiling the history of his country from first to last, as far as he could gather it, from all the materials then to be found in all the considerable libraries in England, and what he could likewise find to his purpose in foreign parts. Whether he found our map and manuscript in our monastic libraries at home, or in the Vatican, or elsewhere abroad, we cannot determine: he himself gives us no other light in the case, than that it was compiled from memoirs _a quodam Duce Romano consignatis, et posteritati relictis_, which I am persuaded is no other than Agricola, under Domitian. But, above all, we have reason to congratulate ourselves, that the present work of his is happily rescued from oblivion, and, most likely, from an absolute destruction. I shall now concisely recite the history of its discovery. * * * * * In the summer of 1747, June 11, whilst I lived at Stamford, I received a letter from Charles Julius Bertram, professor of the English tongue in the Royal Marine Academy of Copenhagen, a person unknown to me. The letter was polite, full of compliments, as usual with foreigners, expressing much candor and respect to me; being only acquainted with some works of mine published: the letter was dated the year before; for all that time he hesitated in sending it. Soon after my receiving it, I sent a civil answer; which produced another letter, with a prolix and elaborate Latin epistle inclosed, from the famous Mr. Gramm, privy-counsellor and chief librarian to his Danish Majesty; a learned gentleman, who had been in England, and visited our universities. (Mr. Martin Folkes remembered him.) He was Mr. Bertram’s great friend and patron. I answered that letter, and it created a correspondence between us. Among other matters, Mr. Bertram mentioned a manuscript, in a friend’s hands, of Richard of Westminster, being a history of Roman Britain, which he thought a great curiosity; and an ancient map of the island annexed.