Barrington, in his _Observations upon the Statutes_, raises some historic doubts whether that massacre of the Welsh bards, upon which Gray founded his magnificent ode, actually occurred:-- "But", he says, "a manuscript history, written by Sir John Wynne of Gwydir, authorises the supposed tradition of a massacre of the bards; nor could the writer of that most admirable ode have made his bard so warmly express, or his reader feel, the tyranny of Edward, if he had not probably raised an indignation and fire in his own breast, and by reading of other materials, which _I have not happened to meet with_." Has the question of this real or pretended massacre been raised, or proved beyond doubt? As to Gray requiring "materials" for his fancy, poets even of inferior genius contrive to weave a web out of airy nothings, and the liveliest description by an old Cymric bard of the slaughters of the thirteenth century, will not carry conviction of the truth of the narrative in the nineteenth. H. T. H. * * * * * Minor Queries. _Portrait of William Combe._--Lonsdale the portrait painter, in a letter dated January, 1826, addressed to a friend of Combe whilst living, says: "I shall be much obliged if you will have the goodness to cause my picture of the late Mr. Combe to be sent to me. Mr. C. borrowed the picture of me to show to some friend, and kept it till his death." {559} Can any of the readers of "N. & Q." inform me in whose possession the portrait now is, and whether any engraving of Combe's portrait from that or any other picture is now to be obtained? E. T. _"Quod non fecerunt barbari," &c._--Who is the author of the epigram-- "Quod non fecerunt barbari, fecerunt Barbarini," which commemorates the destruction of the Coliseum at Rome, both by the barbarians who overran Italy about the middle of the fifth century, and, at a later period, by certain Popes of the family of the Barberini? HENRY H. BREEN. St. Lucia. _Lines on English History_ (Vol. iii., p. 168.; Vol. v., p. 405.).--I shall be extremely obliged to MR. EDWARD CHARLTON to procure me, if he can, a copy of the above lines, and forward them, through Mr. Bell, to AN ENGLISH MOTHER. [We should also be most glad to receive from any correspondent who can supply it, the _Metrical and Logical History_, asked for by our lamented correspondent MÆRIS, which commences-- "William and William, and Henry and Stephen, And Henry the Second to make the First even." ED.]