Page:Poems of Anne Countess of Winchilsea 1903.djvu/50

 xlvi INTRODUCTION ���ter published in Peck's Desiderata Curiosa (1732), saying that he had his information from Heneage, Earl of Win- chilsea, whom he visited at Eastwell Park in 1720. An anony- mous tract, entitled The Parallel, and published in London, 1744, tells the story of Kichard, and closes with these words: �This house of Eastwell Place came afterwards into possession of the eldest Branch of the noble Family of Finch, and it is to the laudable curiosity of the late Heneage, Earl of Winchilsea, a Noble- man whose virtues threw a Shade on the age in which he lived, that we owe the several particulars I have given the Reader. They were frequently the topic of that good man's Conversation, who would sometimes show that Spot in his Park, upon which the House of old Richard stood, and which had been pulled down by the Earl's Father. " But I," said the most worthy Lord, " had it reached my Time, would sooner have pulled down that," pointing to his own House. As a testimony to the Truth of this remarkable History he was wont to produce the following Entry in the Register of the Parish Church at Eastwell : "Anno Domini 1555 Richard Plantagenet was buried the 22nd December, Anno ut supra." �Mr. Finch's antiquarian tastes and learning received early and frequent recognition. Harris, in his History of Kent, records the accidental discovery, in 1703, of a small urn of reddish earth and of the skeleton of a child, in a cutting along the wagon- way near Wye. In 1713 he writes of it : �The Report of this Discovery brought the Right Honourable Colonel Heneage Finch (now Earl of Winchilsea) whose inquisitive genius inclines him to a curious search after Antiquities, and of which he hath a nice Relish and is an excellent Judge, to come out and examine this place more narrowly which was done the same year. �The results of this investigation were all left in the hands of Lord Winchilsea. Dr. Stukeley says that during the nine years he lived in London (1717-1726) he had "the greatest intimacy with Thomas, L d Pembroke, Heneage Earl of Winchelsea, Sir Isaac Newton in short with the whole sett ��� �