Madden, with his great skill and experience in
palaeography, might have recognised ; and the other
was a very remarkable document on parchment —
so remarkable, that it is astonishing how Sir F.
Madden could have become possessed of it without
suspicion. It was an Address from all the Members
of Lincoln's Inn to the Queen in 1584, declaring that
they would defend her to the last against Spain, and
against all her open or concealed enemies ; and the
very first name at the bottom of the instrument (and
it contained very many) was that of Sir Thomas
Egerton, then Solicitor-General. This document was
printed at fiill length in the Egerton Papers by the
Camden Society in 1840, and when it was printed it
attracted much attention. Nevertheless, Sir F. Mad-
den had bought the original ; and the late Earl of
EUesmere wished the matter to be investigated,
though, as far as I am aware, it was never his de-
sign to prosecute. Keally and truly, if Sir F. Mad-
den had then been indicted for receiving stolen goods,
knowing them to have been stolen, it might have



30 Mr. J. Payne Collier^s Reply to

gone bard with him. I should willingly have been
one of his witnesses to character.
Some men can forget an injury who never can
forgive an obligation ; but I assure Sir F. Madden
that he was not in the slightest degree indebted
to me on the occasion : all along the Earl of
Ellesmere was convinced that the Keeper of the
Manuscripts had only acted carelessly, not criminally.
