away, the sparrow desisted, and came thither no more. Two of the servants that attended the Major, and sober persons, declared this for a certainty.

Sir Walter Long's (of Draycot in Wilts) widow, did make a solemn promise to him on his death-bed, that she would not marry after his decease, but not long after, one Sir Fox, a very beautiful young gentleman, did win her love; so that notwithstanding her promise aforesaid, she married him: she married at South-Wraxhall, where the picture of Sir Walter hung over the parlour door, as it doth now at Draycot. As Sir -Fox led his bride by the hand from the church, (which is near to the house) into the parlour, the string of the picture broke, and the picture fell on her shoulder, and cracked in the fall. (It was painted on wood, as the fashion was in those days.) This made her ladyship reflect on her promise, and drew some tears from her eyes.*

See Sir Walter Raleigh's history, book 4, chap. 2, §. 7. The dogs of the French army, the night before the battle of Novara, ran all to the Swisses army: the next day, the Swisses obtained a glorious victory of the French. Walter Raleigh affirms it to be certainly true.

Sir

The last battle fought in the north of Ireland, between the Protestants and the Papists, was in Glinsuly near

* This story may be true in all its details, except the name of the lady, who was a daughter of Sir W. Long; she married Somerset Fox, Esq. See Sandford's Geneal. Hist. of the Kings of England, p. 344.

Letterkenny in the county of Donegall. Veneras, the Bishop of Clogher, was General of the Irish army; and that of the Parliament army, Sir Charles Coot. They pitched their tents on each side the river Suly, and the Papists constantly persist in it to this very day, that the night before the action,* a woman of uncommon stature, all in white, appearing to the said Bishop, admonished him not to cross the river first, to assault the enemy, but suffer them to do it, whereby he should obtain the victory. That if the Irish took the water first to move towards the English, they should be put to a total rout, which came to pass. Ocahan, and Sir Henry O'Neal, who were both killed there, saw severally the same apparition, and dissuaded the Bishop from giving the first onset, but could not prevail upon him. In the mean time, I find nothing in this revelation, that any common soldier might not conclude without extraordinary means.

Near the same place, a party of the Protestants had been surprized sleeping by the Popish Irish, were it not for several wrens that just wakened them by dancing and pecking on the drums as the enemy were approaching. For this reason the wild Irish mortally hate these birds, to this day, calling them the Devil's servants, and killing them wherever they catch them; they teach their children

* So an apparition of a woman greater than ordinary, beckoned to Julius Cæsar to pass over the Rubicon, L. Flor. lib. 4. Satyres appeared to Alexander when he besieged Tyrus; Alexander asked the divines, what was the signification of it; they told him the meaning is plain, à Tupos (i.e.) Tyre is thine. Alexander took the town. Q. Curtius.

to thrust them full of thorns: you will see sometimes on holidays, a whole parish running like mad men from hedge to hedge a wren-hunting.

Anno 1679. After the discovery of the Popish plot, the penal laws were put in execution against the Roman Catholics; so that, if they did not receive the sacrament according to the church of England, in their parish church, they were to be severely proceeded against according to law Mr. Ployden, to avoid the penalty, went to his parish church at Lasham, near Alton, in Hampshire: when Mr. Laurence (the minister) had put the chalice into Mr. Ployden's hand, the cup of it (wherein the wine was) fell off. 'Tis true, it was out of order before; and he had a tremor in his hand. The communion was stopt by this accident. This was attested to me by two neighbouring ministers, as also by several gentlemen of the neighbourhood.

When King James II. first entered Dublin, after his arrival from France, 1689, one of the gentlemen that bore the mace before him, stumbled without any rub in his way, or other visible occasion. The mace fell out of his hands, and the little cross upon the crown thereof stuck fast between two stones in the street. This is very well known all over Ireland, and did much trouble King James himself, with many of his chief attendants.

The first Moors that were expelled Spain, were in number five thousand five hundred and fifty-five. from Denia, October 2, 1609. II. Bleda. Moriscos, p. 1000.

They sailed Expulsion de

E that has a mind to read of dreams, may peruse Cicero de Divinatione, Hier. Cardani Somniorum Synesiorum, lib. 4, and Moldina

H

rius de Insomniis, &c. I shall here mention but little out of them, my purpose being chiefly to set down some remarkable and divine dreams of some that I have had the honour to be intimately acquainted with, persons worthy of belief.

Cicero de Divinatione, lib. 1. Hannibalem, Cælius scribit, cùm Columnam auream, quæ esset in fano Junonis Lacinia, auferre vellet, dubitaretque utrum ea solida esset, an extrinsecus inaurata, perterebravisse; cumque solidam invenisset, statuissetque tollere: secundum quietem visam esse ei Junonem prædicere, ne id faceret; minarique, si id fecisset se curaturam, ut eum quoque oculum, quo bene videret, amitteret; idque ab homine acuto non esse neglectum; itaque ex eo auro quod exterebratum esset, buculam

curasse faciendam, & eam in summa columna collocavisse.

i. e.

Coelius writes, that Hannibal, when he had a mighty mind to take away a gold pillar, that was in the Temple of Juno Lacinia, being in doubt with himself, whether it was solid massive gold, or only gilt, or thinly plated over on the out side, bored it through. When he had found it to be solid, and fully designed to have it carried off; Juno appeared to him in his sleep, and forewarned him against what he was about, threatening him withal, that if he persisted and did it, she would take care that he should lose the eye, that he saw perfectly well with, as he had done the other.

The great man, it seems, was too wise to slight and neglect this warning; nay, he even took care to have a ring made of the very gold, that had been bored out of it, and placed it on the top of the pillar.

·Cum duo quidam Arcades familiares iter unà facerent, & Megaram venissent, alterum ad cauponem divertisse; ad hospitem alterum. Qui, ut cœnati quiescerent, concubia nocte visum esse in somnis ei qui erat in hospitio, illum alterum orare ut subveniret, quòd sibi à caupone interitus pararetur; eum primò perterritum somnio surrexisse; deinde cùm se colligisset, idque visum pro nihilo habendum esse duxisset, recubuisse; tum ei dormienti eundem illum visum esse rogare, ut quoniam sibi vivo non subvenisset, mortem suam ne inultam esse