2. _Sir_ HENRY SPELMAN. He was born at Congham, in 1561, or 1562. Before he was fifteen he was sent to Trinity College, in Cambridge; but his father dying in about two years and half after, he was taken home by his mother to assist her in managing the affairs of the family. About a year after, he was sent to Lincoln’s Inn to study the law, where having continued almost three years, he retired into the country, and married a Lady of good family and fortune. Beside his own rural and domestic concerns, which now demanded and employed the chief of his attention, he was also very assiduous to improve himself in the knowledge of the Constitution, Laws and Antiquities of his Country. He was early admitted a member of the Society of Antiquaries, which brought him into an intimate acquaintance with Sir Robert Cotton, Camden, and others of the most eminent men for that kind of literature. In 1604, he was appointed High Sheriff of Norfolk, and about the same time wrote a description of that county, which he communicated to _Speed_: but it was not the first book he wrote: a book on Heraldry, and another on the Coins of the kingdom, he had before written; and perhaps more. In 1607, the king nominated him one of the Commissioners for determining the unsettled titles of lands and manors in Ireland; on which occasion he went thither several times, and discharged the trust reposed in him with great reputation. He was also appointed one of the Commissioners to enquire into the oppression of exacted fees in all courts and offices, as well ecclesiastical as civil; which gave rise to his treatise _De Sepultura_, or of the Burial Fees, in which he made it evident, that most part of the fees exacted by the clergy and church officers, on account of funerals, is no better than gross imposition. His close attention to those public employments proved prejudicial to his family and circumstances; in consideration of which the government made him a present of 300_l_, till something better could be done for him. His majesty also conferred on him the honour of knighthood, which, however, did probably impoverish rather than enrich him. His majesty did what was still worse, in prohibiting the Meetings of the Antiquarian Society, lest, forsooth, they might be led to treat of _state affairs_! {179} His wise majesty seemed conscious that those affairs were too brittle to be handled, and too foul to be exposed to open daylight. When about fifty he went to reside in London, and gave himself up to archaiological studies. He collected all such books and MSS. as he could find of that description, whether foreign or domestic. In 1626, he published the first part of his well known _Glossary_, which he never carried beyond the letter L, because, as some have suggested, he had said things under _Magna Charta_, and _Maximum Concilium_, that could not then have appeared without giving offence. He wrote many things, most of which are still held in considerable repute.