on a Barn in Kent, &c. 1 17

Between this infcription and the Helmdon date there is this dif- ference, that in the latter the, numerals for the tens and fmaller figure are placed at a diftance from the other characters. There feems, however, to have been a fhidied conceit and quaintnefs in arranging the infcription, brief as it is. I cannot refer to any other infcription in which the word Dom' is fet before anno ; and here it might be fo placed under an opinion that the numerals for one year only would more aptly follow -ann And it is well known that the learned in that age were pleafed with fuch a jingle in the termination of words as would be occafioned by Millefimo, Quinqna- gefimo, Domini, Anno, trtcefimo, tertio. It was a rule laid dawn by Profeflbr Ward that any coin, infcrip- tion, or manufcript, with a fuppofed date before the thirteenth century expreiTed in Arabic figures, may juftly be fufpedled either not to be genuine, or not truly read, unlefs the antiquity of it be certain from other clear and undoubted circurmtances, and that the date will bear no other reading ; and if it be a copy, that it be taken with exaclinefs. In fupport, therefore, of the doubts I have fuggefted on his mode of reading the Helmdon date, I mall by this rule be warranted to remark, that fo far from the imputed anti- quity of it being evident from other unqueftionable circumftances, the form of the chimney-piece and its embelliihments feem to be- tray an anachronifm, by exhibiting marks of a later period than the thirteenth century. Dr. Wallis obferved that in one half of the front of the mantle- tree there is a dragon with wings, and on the other half three pa- nels with the date. Three other panels having on them what he termed a flower, and a fmgle panel that had two letters within an efcutcheon. In my opinion there is befides on the dexter divifion one particular, though not noticed by him, far more likely, as it is there placed, to have occurred to a mechanic of the fixteenth than of