_Compositions under the Protectorate_ (Vol. v., p. 68.).--Such is the name of a heading to one of your recent Notes; and such is the formula of the very common error that Dring's _List_, and the lists of his re-editors, represent the fines levied by Cromwell when he decimated the incomes (not the estates) of the Royalists, in consequence of Penruddock's rising. Dring's _List_ has reference to the compositions during the years 1646-1648, when the fines were based on a totally different calculation. The error has arisen from Dring's catalogue having been published in 1655, the year after Penruddock's affair. I have compared a great number of the compositions as they are stated in the Lord's Journals, 1646, _et seq._, with Dring's account; and though there are discrepancies, their average resemblance is sufficient to show that they refer to one and the same affair. Indeed, any one acquainted with the actors in those events will see in a moment that Dring's _List_ contains many who had repented of and acknowledged their "delinquency." J. WAYLEN. _Hoax on Sir Walter Scott_ (Vol. v., p. 438.).--The reperusal of Mr. Drury's hoax upon Sir Walter reminds me of another, which having escaped the industry of, or been intentionally overlooked by Mr. Lockhart, may be appropriately noticed in your pages, as pleasantly showing that even "ANSELMO's" black-letter sagacity might be deceived; and that, with the simple credulity of his own Monkbarns, he could mistake the "bit bourock of the mason-callants" for a Roman Pretorium. I allude to a small stitchlet, or brochure, of five pages, entitled "The Raid of Featherstonehaugh: a Border Ballad." It was really written by Sir Walter's early friend, Mr. Robert Surtees of Mainsforth, author of the _History of Durham_, some of whose other impositions upon the poet were printed in the _Border Minstrelsy_, or inserted in notes to his _Metrical Romances_. Of this poem in particular, Sir Walter entertained so high an opinion, that he has incorporated a verse from it into _Marmion_, and given it entire in a note as a genuine relic of antiquity; gravely commenting upon it in the most elaborate manner, and pointing out its exemplifications of the then state of society. It will be found in _Marmion_, Canto I., verse 13.: "The whiles a northern harper rude." WILLIAM BATES. Birmingham.