Britton's work. But, in spite of its excellence, it was so little a financial success, that its publication had to be cut short, leaving untouched the cathedrals of Carlisle, Chester, Chichester, Durham, Ely, Lincoln, and Rochester. At the end of vol. iv., while thanking the public for its purchase of 800 copies, Britton complains with natural warmth of the scant encouragement or information received from cathedral authorities. To No. 53 (August 1835) he prefixed a sketch of the history of the work, with a continuation to that date of his literary autobiography since 1825, the period which it had reached in vol. iii. of the 'Beauties of Wiltshire.' During the progress of the work he produced, with the cooperation of Pugin, the 'Specimens of Gothic Architecture' (1823-5), and the 'Architectural Antiquities of Norway ' (1825). In 1825-8 appeared his 'Public Buildings of London,' engraved and described, and in 1832-8 his useful 'Dictionary of the Architecture and Archaeology of the Middle Ages.' He co-operated with Brayley in the production of the valuable 'History and Description of the Ancient Palace and Houses of Parliament at Westminster' (1834-6), and contributed the letterpress to the 'Architectural Description of Windsor' (1842).
On 7 July 1845 Britton was entertained at dinner at Richmond by a number of admirers. After the formation of a Britton Club in the December of the same year, a sum of nearly 1,000l. was raised by a subscription, Britton having previously intimated his intention to devote any money so raised to the publication of an autobiography. He accepted an annual pension on the civil list procured for him by Mr. Disraeli when chancellor of the exchequer. In 1850 appeared 'The Autobiography of John Britton. In three parts.' Part i. scarcely brought down his autobiography further than 1825, but it was written very much more fully than the previous fragments. Part ii. (and last) is a 'descriptive account' of his literary productions of every kind, drawn up by Mr. T. E. Jones, who had for fifteen years been his amanuensis and secretary. Britton died in London on 1 Jan. 1857. "There is a succinct but adequate account of Britton's services to archaeological art in Mr. Digby Wyatt's obituary 'notice' of him read before the Royal Institute of British Architects on 12 Jan. 1857, and published in the volume of its 'Papers' for 1856-7.
Britton was for many years an active member of the Royal Literary Fund, and his protests against the provisions of the Copyright Acts compelling the transmission of eleven copies of every work, however costly, published in the United Kingdom to certain public and other libraries, contributed to the reduction of that number to six. He was instrumental in founding the Wiltshire Topographical Society. Having corresponded on the subject in 1831 with the first Lord Lansdowne, he proposed in 1837 the formation of a society to be called 'The Guardian of National Antiquities,' and in 1840 he published a 'Letter to Joseph Hume on the subject of making some government provision for preserving the ancient monuments of Great Britain.' Britton himself successfully promoted the reparation of Waltham Cross and of the parish church of Stratford-upon-Avon.
Several of Britton's minor publications not previously noticed deserve mention. In 1816 he issued an engraved view of Shakespeare's bust in the church of Stratford with 'Remarks,' in which he disputed the genuineness of the accepted portraits, and contended for the superior value of the bust as a likeness. His 'Remarks on the Life and Writings of Shakespeare' in the Whittingham edition of 1814 were expanded in successive editions, with a useful list appended of essays and dissertations on Shakespeare's dramatic writings. Britton's 'Memoir of Aubrey,' 1845 (for the Wiltshire Topographical Society), is one of the best biographies of the Wiltshire antiquary that have appeared, and contains interesting extracts from Aubrey's unpublished correspondence. For the same society Britton edited all that is valuable in Aubrey's (until then unpublished) 'Natural History of Wiltshire,' 1843. In 1830 he published an annotated edition of Anstey's 'New Bath Guide,' and in 1848 'The Authorship of the Letters of Junius elucidated, including a biographical memoir of Colonel Barré,' to whom he attributed them (see Quarterly Review for December 1851). Besides being one of the most continuously productive writers and editors of his time, Britton for many years performed the duties of surveyor and clerk to a local board of commissioners.
[Britton's writings, especially his Autobiography; Gent. Mag. February 1857; Builder, 10 Jan. 1857; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
BRITTON, THOMAS (1664?–1714), the celebrated 'musical small-coal man,' was born at either Higham Ferrers or Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, about the middle of the seventeenth century. He came up to London at an early age and apprenticed himself to a vendor of small coal in St. John Street, Clerkenwell, for seven years. At the end of this time his master gave him a small sum not to set up a rival establish-
