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As we got more into the flat country, we found, that however qualified it's objects were to melt into a beautiful distance, it contained nothing engaging on the fpot. All the country through which the Trent flows, as far as we could command it from the great road, is unpicturesque.

Newark was formerly defended by a castle; which is now but an unpleasing ruin. It has more the appearance of a dwelling, than a fortrefs. It was once however a confiderable place, and, at the conclufion of the civil wars, fuftained a fiege of feven months from the whole Scotch army; during which period, in the neceffity of the times, thofe fhillings in the form of lozenges were ftamped, which are now found in collections of old coins. They bear a crown on one fide, infcribed C. R.; and on the other, mark the occafion of their being ftruck. Here also began that infamous treaty for the fale of the king, who had delivered himself into the hands of the Scotch army, of which the whole nation hath deservedly been ashamed ever fince.

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From Newark the country ftill continues dreary and uninteresting. When the road happens to make any little rife, we had, far to the right, a distant view of Lincoln-cathedral, over the flats between it and the eye. It is fo noble a pile, that it makes a respectable object at the distance of twenty miles. But this extraordinary appearance is owing to a mere deception: for tho the eye confiders it as standing in the plain; it stands in fact upon a hill; and the elevation of the ground being loft in the distance, all its height is added to the church. The whole country

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between Newark and Lincoln is highly cultivated; and is famous for a breed of large sheep, and heavy horfes, peculiar to itself.

A little after you pass Tuxford, you see the deception in the fituation of Lincoln-cathedral. It appears there plainly to ftand at the point of a long ridge of elevated land, rifing above the flat country.

In this neighbourhood lie a cluster of great houses. Thoresby belongs to the celebrated

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duchefs

duchefs of Kingston. We rode through the park, which has no advantages of fituation. The house we found fhut up by the duchess's order.

Welbeck, the duke of Portland's feat, we did dot fee. It lay fome miles out of the road. Clumber-park, the feat of the duke of Newcastle, disappointed us. We expected an old magnificent houfe, a park adorned with oaks, that had feen a fourth or a fifth generation of their noble owners; and other appendages of ancient grandeur. But every thing is new: the house is just built, the woods just planted; and the walks just planned. Clumber-park will hardly be worth a traveller's notice before the next century.

A few miles farther lies. Worksop. This house is a fingular inftance of the fpirit, perfeverance, and difinterestedness, of it's proprietor, the duke of Norfolk. It had belonged formerly to the earls of Shrewsbury, and was gone much into decay. But the duke liking the fituation; and conceiving it to be a good centre-house to his great estates in these parts, resolved to restore it to it's ancient fplendor. He was now in years; but for the advantage of his heir, the honourable Mr. Edward Howard,

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