a celebrated writer of burlesque verses in the reigns of Charles II. and James II. His most noted piece is a travesty of the first and fourth books of the *Æneid*, entitled *Scarronides*, which is generally regarded as excelling Scarron's famous production. He also executed a burlesque translation of several of Lucian's dialogues under the title of *The Scoffer Seoff'd*, and wrote a more serious poem entitled *The Wonders of the Peak*. The exact period of Cotton's birth and death is nowhere recorded, but it is probable that he died about the time of the Revolution. He seems to have been in opulent circumstances, although on account of inserting a humorous description of his grandmother's ruff in the travesty of Virgil, he lost an estate worth L400 a-year which the old lady had previously designed to bequeath to him.

CORROS, Sir Robert Bruce, an eminent English antiquary, descended from an ancient family, and born at Denton, Huntingdonshire, in 1570. His antiquarian tastes were early displayed in the collection of ancient records, charters, and other manuscripts, which had been dispersed from the monastic libraries in the reign of Henry VIII. With regard to these, Camden, Selden, Speed, and others, have confessed their obligations to him. He held a distinguished place in the society of antiquaries during the reign of Elizabeth; and at the first creation of baronets he was appointed to that honour by James I. To both of these sovereigns he rendered essential service by the zeal with which at their suggestion he investigated difficult questions of constitutional law and state policy; and his opinions recorded for their guidance are still preserved among the MSS. of the Cottonian Library. During the reign of Charles I., Sir Robert espoused the cause of the people; and having been represented as the author of a tract in favour of Tyranny, which was written by Sir Robert Dudley in 1615, and had escaped from his library, he was thrown into the Tower, and his collection was arrested. After his release he was still denied access to his library—a circumstance which affected him so much that he died soon after, May 6, 1631. His library, which received numerous additions from his son and grandson, after having been partly destroyed by fire in 1781, was transferred to the British Museum in 1757. A catalogue of its contents was published by Dr. Thomas Smith in 1696, and another has since been made and published by Joseph Planta, Esq.