Part 1
Produced by Charlene Taylor, Jonathan Ingram, Keith Edkins and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Library of Early Journals.)
Transcriber's note: on page 399, "Yule College" in the original is corrected to "Yale College".
* * * * *
{381}
NOTES AND QUERIES:
A MEDIUM OF INTER-COMMUNICATION FOR LITERARY MEN, ARTISTS, ANTIQUARIES, GENEALOGISTS, ETC.
"When found, make a note of."--CAPTAIN CUTTLE.
* * * * *
No. 208.] SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22. 1853. [Price Fourpence. Stamped Edition 5d.
* * * * *
CONTENTS.
NOTES:-- Page
A Prophet 381
FOLK LORE:--Folk Lore in Cambridgeshire--New Brunswick Folk Lore--North Lincolnshire Folk Lore--Portuguese Folk Lore 382
Pope and Cowper, By J. Yeowell 383 Shakspeare Correspondence, by Patrick Muirson, &c. 383
MINOR NOTES:--Judicial Families--Derivation of "Topsy Turvy"--Dictionaries and Encyclopaedias-- "Mary, weep no more for me"--Epitaph at Wood Ditton--Pictorial Pun 384
QUERIES:--
Sir Thomas Button's Voyage, 1612, by John Petheram 385
MINOR QUERIES:--The Words "Cash" and "Mob" --"History of Jesus Christ"--Quantity of the Latin Termination -anus--Webb and Walker Families-- Cawdrey's "Treasure of Similes"--Point of Etiquette --Napoleon's Spelling--Trench on Proverbs--Rings formerly worn by Ecclesiastics--Butler's "Lives of the Saints"--Marriage of Cousins--Castle Thorpe, Bucks--Where was Edward II. killed?--Encore-- Amcotts' Pedigree--Blue Bell: Blue Anchor-- "We've parted for the longest time"--Matthew Lewis--Paradise Lost--Colonel Hyde Seymour-- Vault at Richmond, Yorkshire--Poems published at Manchester--Handel's Dettingen Te Deum-- Edmund Spenser and Sir Hans Sloane, Bart. 386
MINOR QUERIES WITH ANSWERS:--The Ligurian Sage --Gresebrok in Yorkshire--Stillingfleet's Library-- The whole System of Law--Saint Malachy on the Popes--Work on the Human Figure 389
REPLIES:--
"Namby Pamby," and other Words of the same Form 390 Earl of Oxford 392 Picts' Houses 392 Pronunciation of "Humble" 393 School Libraries 395
PHOTOGRAPHIC CORRESPONDENCE:--Albumenized Paper --Cement for Glass Baths--New Process for Positive Proofs 395
REPLIES TO MINOR QUERIES:--The Groaning Elmplank in Dublin--Passage in Whiston--"When Orpheus went down"--Foreign Medical Education --"Short red, good red"--Collar of SS.--Who first thought of Table-turning--Passage of Thucydides on the Greek Factions--Origin of "Clipper" as applied to Vessels--Passage in Tennyson--Huet's Navigations of Solomon--Sincere--The Saltpetre Man-- Major Andre--Longevity--Passage in Virgil--Love Charm from a Foal's Forehead--Wardhouse, where was?--Divining Rod--Waugh, Bishop of Carlisle-- Pagoda 397
MISCELLANEOUS:--
Books and Odd Volumes wanted 401 Notices to Correspondents 401 Advertisements 402
* * * * *
Notes.
A PROPHET.
What a curious book would be "Our Prophets and Enthusiasts!" The literary and biographical records of the vaticinators, and the heated spirits who, after working upon the fears of the timid, and exciting the imaginations of the weak, have flitted into oblivion! As a specimen of the odd characters such a work would embrace, allow me to introduce to your readers Thomas Newans, a Shropshire farmer, who unhappily took it into his head that his visit to the lower sphere was on a special mission.
Mr. Newans is the author of a book entitled _A Key to the Prophecies of the Old and New Testament_; showing (among other impending events) "The approaching Invasion of England;" "The Extirpation of Popery and Mahometisme;" "The Restoration of the Jews," and "The Millennium." London: printed for the Author (who attests the genuineness of my copy by his signature), 1747.
In this misfitted key he relates how, in a vision, he was invested with the prophetic mantle:
"In the year 1723, in the night," says Mr. Newans, "I fell into a dream, and seemed to be riding on the road into the county of Cheshire. When I was got about eight miles from home, my horse made a stop on the road; and it seemed a dark night, and on a sudden there shone a light before me on the ground, which was as bright as when the sun shines at noon-day. In the middle of that bright circle stood a child in white. It spoke, and told me that I must go into Cheshire, and I should find a man with uncommon marks upon his feet, which should be a warning to me to believe; and that the year after I should have a cow that would calve a calf with his heart growing out of his body in a wonderful manner, as a token of what should come to pass; and that a terrible war would break out in Europe, and in fourteen years after the token it would extend to England."
In compliance with his supernatural communication, our farmer proceeded to Cheshire, where he found the man indicated; and, a year after, his own farm stock was increased by the birth of a calf with his heart growing out. And after taking his family, of seven, to witness to the truth of {382} what he describes, he adds with great simplicity: "So then I rode to London to acquaint the ministers of state of the approaching danger!"
This story of the calf with the heart growing out, is not a bad type of the worthy grazier himself, and his _hearty_ and burning zeal for the Protestant faith. Mr. Newans distinctly and repeatedly predicts that these "two beastly religions," _i. e._ the Popish and Mahomedan, will be totally extirpated within seven years! And "I have," says he, "for almost twenty years past, travelled to London and back again into the country, near fifty journies, and every journey was two hundred and fifty miles, to acquaint the ministers of state and several of the bishops, and other divines, with the certainty, danger, and manner of the war" which was to bring this about. Commenting on the story of Balaam, our prophet says: "And now the world is grown so full of sin and wickedness, that if a dumb ass should speak with a man's voice, they would scarce repent:" and I conclude that the said statesmen and divines did not estimate these prophetic warnings much higher than the brayings of that quadruped which they turned out to be. Mr. Newan professes to gave penned these vaticinations in the year 1744, twenty-one years after the date of his vision; so that he had ample time to mature them. What would the farmer say were he favoured with a peep at our world in 1853, with its Mussulman system unbroken; and its cardinal, archbishops, and Popish bishops firmly established in the very heart of Protestant England?
J. O.
* * * * *
FOLK LORE.
_Folk Lore in Cambridgeshire._--About twenty years ago, at Hildersham, there was a custom of ringing the church bell at five o'clock in the leasing season. The cottagers then repaired to the fields to glean; but none went out before the bell was rung. The bell tolled again in the evening as a signal for all to return home. I would add a Query, Is this custom continued; and is it to be met with in any other place?
F. M. MIDDLETON.
_New Brunswick Folk Lore_:--_Common Notions respecting Teeth._--Among the lower orders and negroes, and also among young children of respectable parents (who have probably derived the notion from contact with the others as nurses or servants), it is here very commonly held that when a tooth is drawn, if you refrain from thrusting the tongue in the cavity, the second tooth will be golden. Does this idea prevail in England?
_Superstition respecting Bridges._--Many years ago my grandfather had quite a household of blacks, some of whom were slaves and some free. Being bred in his family, a large portion of my early days was thus passed among them, and I have often reverted to the weird superstitions with which they froze themselves and alarmed me. Most of these had allusion to the devil: scarcely one of them that I now recollect but referred to him. Among others they firmly held that when the clock struck twelve at midnight, the devil and a select company of his inferiors regularly came upon that part of the bridge called "the draw," and danced a hornpipe there. So firmly did they hold to this belief, that no threat nor persuasion could induce the stoutest-hearted of them to cross the fatal draw after ten o'clock at night. This belief is quite contrary to that which prevails in Scotland, according to which, Robin Burns being my authority, "neither witches nor any evil spirits have power to follow a poor wight any farther than the middle of the next running stream."[1]
C. D. D.
New Brunswick, New Jersey.
[Footnote 1:
"Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, And win the key-stane of the brig: There at them thou thy tail may toss, A running stream they dare na crass."--_Tam O'Shanter._
]
_North Lincolnshire Folk Lore._--Here follow some shreds of folk lore which I have not seen as yet in "N. & Q." They all belong to North Lincolnshire.
1. Death sign. If a swarm of bees alight on a dead tree, or on the dead bough of a living tree, there will be a death in the family of the owner during the year.
2. If you do not throw salt into the fire before you begin to churn, the butter will not come.
3. If eggs are brought over running water they will have no chicks in them.
4. It is unlucky to bring eggs into the house after sunset.
5. If you wear a snake's skin round your head you will never have the headache.
6. Persons called Agnes always go mad.
7. A person who is born on Christmas Day will be able to see spirits.
8. Never burn egg-shells; if you do, the hens cease to lay.
9. If a pigeon is seen sitting in a tree, or comes into the house, or from being wild suddenly becomes tame, it is a sign of death.
10. When you see a magpie you should cross yourself; if you do not you will be unlucky.
EDWARD PEACOCK.
Bottesford Moors.
_Portuguese Folk Lore._--
"The borderer whispered in my ear that he was one of the dreadful Lobishomens, a devoted race, held in mingled horror and commiseration, and never mentioned {383} without by the Portuguese peasantry. They believe that if a woman be delivered of seven male infants successively, the seventh, by an inexplicable fatality, becomes subject to the powers of darkness; and is compelled, on every Saturday evening, to assume the likeness of an ass. So changed, and followed by a horrid train of dogs, he is forced to run an impious race over the moors and through the villages; nor is allowed an interval of rest until the dawning Sabbath terminates his sufferings, and restores him to his human shape."--From Lord Carnarvon's _Portugal and Gallicia_, vol. ii. p. 268.
E. H. A.
* * * * *
POPE AND COWPER.
In Cowper's letter to Lady Hesketh, dated January 18, 1787, occurs a notice for the first time of Mr. Samuel Rose, with whom Cowper subsequently corresponded. He informs Lady Hesketh that--
"A young gentleman called here yesterday, who came six miles out of his way to see me. He was on a journey to London from Glasgow, having just left the University there. He came, I suppose, partly to satisfy his own curiosity, but chiefly, as it seemed, to bring me the thanks of some of the Scotch professors for my two volumes. His name is Rose, an Englishman."
Prefixed to a copy of Hayley's _Life and Letters of William Cowper, Esq._, in the British Museum, is an extract in MS. of a letter from the late Samuel Rose, Esq., to his favourite sister, Miss Harriet Rose, written in the year before his marriage, at the age of twenty-two, and which, I believe, has never been printed. It may, perhaps, merit a corner of "N. & Q."
"Weston Lodge, Sept. 9, 1789.
"Last week Mr. Cowper finished the _Odyssey_, and we drank an unreluctant bumper to its success. The labour of translation is now at an end, and the less arduous work of revision remains to be done, and then we shall see it published. I promise both you and myself much pleasure from its perusal. You will most probably find it at first less pleasing than Pope's versification, owing to the difference subsisting between blank verse and rhyme--a difference which is not sufficiently attended to, and whereby people are led into injudicious comparisons. You will find Mr. Pope more refined: Mr. Cowper more simple, grand, and majestic; and, indeed, insomuch as Mr. Pope is more refined than Mr. Cowper, he is more refined than his original, and in the same proportion departs from Homer himself. Pope's must universally be allowed to be a beautiful poem: Mr. Cowper's will be found a striking and a faithful portrait, and a pleasing picture to those who enjoy his style of colouring, which I am apprehensive is not so generally acceptable as the other master's. Pope possesses the gentle and amiable graces of a Guido: Cowper is endowed with the bold sublime genius of a Raphael. After having said so much upon their comparative merits, enough, I hope, to refute your second assertion which was, that women, in the opinion of men, have little to do with literature. I may inform you, that the _Iliad_ is to be dedicated to Earl Cowper, and the _Odyssey_ to the Dowager Lady Spencer but this information need not be extensively circulated."
J. YEOWELL.
50. Burton Street.
* * * * *
SHAKSPEARE CORRESPONDENCE.
_"As You Like It."_--Believing that whatever illustrates, even to a trifling extent, the great dramatic poet of England will interest the readers of "N. & Q.," I solicit their attention to the resemblance between the two following passages:
"All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players."
"Si recte aspicias, _vita haec est fabula quaedam_. _Scena autem, mundus versatilis_: _histrio et actor_ _Quilibet est hominum--mortales nam proprie cuncti_ _Sunt personati_, et falsa sub imagine, vulgi Praestringunt oculos: _ita Diis, risumque jocumque_, _Stultitiis, nugisque suis per saecula praebent_. . . . . . . . . "Jam mala quae humanum patitur genus, adnumerabo. _Principio_ postquam e latebris male olentibus alvi Eductus tandem est, materno sanguine foedus, _Vagit, et auspicio lacrymarum nascitur infans_. . . . . . . . . "Vix natus jam vincla subit, tenerosque coercet Fascia longa artus: praesagia dire futuri Servitii. . . . . . . . . "Post ubi jam valido se poplite sustinet, et jam Rite loqui didicit, tunc servire incipit, atque Jussa pati, _sentitque minas ictusque magistri_, Saepe patris matrisque manu fratrisque frequenter Pulsatur: facient quid vitricus atque noverca? _Fit juvenis, crescunt vires_: jam spernit habenas, Occluditque aures monitis, furere incipit, ardens Luxuria atque ira: et temerarius omnia nullo Consilio aggreditur, dictis melioribus obstat, Deteriora fovens: _non ulla pericula curat_, Dummodo id efficiat, suadet quod coeca libido. . . . . . . . . "_Succedit gravior, melior, prudentior aetas_, Cumque ipsa curae adveniunt, durique labores; Tune homo mille modis, studioque enititur omni Rem facere, et nunquam sibi multa negotia desunt. Nunc peregre it, nunc ille domi, nunc rure laborat, Ut sese, uxorem, natos, famulosque gubernet, Ac servet, solus pro cunctis sollicitus, nec Jucundis fruitur dapibus, nec nocte quieta. Ambitio hunc etiam impellens, _ad publica mittit_ _Munia_: dumque inhiat vano male sanus honori, Invidiae atque odii patitur mala plurima: deinceps _Obrepit canis rugosa senecta capillis_, Secum multa trahens incommoda corporis atque Mentis: nam _vires abeunt, speciesque colorque_, Nec non _deficiunt sensus_: _audire, videre_ {384} _Languescunt, gustusque minor fit_: denique semper Aut hoc, aut illo morbo vexantur--_inermi_ _Manduntur vix ore cibi_, _vix crura bacillo_ _Sustentata meant_: animus quoque vulnera sentit. _Desipit, et longo torpet confectus ab aevo_."
It would have only occupied your space needlessly, to have transcribed at length the celebrated description of the seven ages of human life from Shakspeare's _As You Like It_; but I would solicit the attention of your readers to the Latin verses, and then to the question, Whether either poet has borrowed from the other? and, should this be decided affirmatively, the farther question would arise, Which is the original?
ARTERUS.
Dublin.
[These lines look like a modern paraphrase of Shakspeare; and our Correspondent has not informed us from what book he has _transcribed_ them.--Ed.]
_Passage in "King John" and "Romeo and Juliet."_--I am neither a commentator nor a reader of commentators on Shakspeare. When I meet with a difficulty, I get over it as well as I can, and think no more of the matter. Having, however, accidentally seen two passages of Shakspeare much ventilated in "N. & Q.," I venture to give my poor conjectures respecting them.
1. _King John._--
"It lies as sightly on the back of him, As great Alcides' _shows_ upon an ass."
I consider _shows_ to be the true reading; the reference being to the ancient _mysteries_, called also _shows_. The machinery required for the celebration of the mysteries was carried by _asses_. Hence the proverb: "Asinus portat mysteriae." The connexion of Hercules--"great Alcides"--with the mysteries, may be learned from Aristophanes and many other ancient writers. And thus the meaning of the passage seems to be: The lion's skin, which once belonged to Richard of the Lion Heart, is as sightly on the back of _Austria_, as were the mysteries of Hercules upon an ass.
2. _Romeo and Juliet._--
"That runaways eyes may wink."
Here I would retain the reading, and interpret _runaways_ as signifying "persons going about on the watch." Perhaps _runagates_, according to modern usage, would come nearer to the proposed signification, but not to be quite up with it. Many words in Shakspeare have significations very remote from those which they now bear.
PATRICK MUIRSON.
_Shakspeare and the Bible._--Has it ever been noticed that the following passage from the Second Part of _Henry IV._, Act I. Sc. 3., is taken from the fourteenth chapter of St. Luke's Gospel?
"What do we then, but draw anew the model In fewer offices; or, at least, desist To build at all? Much more, in this great work, (Which is almost to pluck a kingdom down, And set another up) should we survey The plot, the situation, and the model; Consult upon a sure foundation, Question surveyors, know our own estate, How able such a work to undergo. A careful leader sums what force he brings To weigh against his opposite; or else We fortify on paper, and in figures, Using the names of men, instead of men: Like one that draws the model of a house Beyond his power to build it."
The passage in St. Luke is as follows (xiv. 28-31.):
"For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it?
"Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him,
"Saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish.
"Or what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand?"
I give the passage as altered by Mr. Collier's Emendator, because I think the line added by him,
"A careful leader sums what force he brings,"
is strongly corroborated by the Scripture text.
Q. D.
* * * * *
Minor Notes.
_Judicial Families._--In vol. v. p. 206. (new edition) of Lord Mahon's _History of England_, we find the following passage:
"Lord Chancellor Camden was the younger son of Chief Justice Pratt,--a case of rare succession in the annals of the law, and not easily matched, unless by their own cotemporaries, Lord Hardwicke and Charles Yorke."
The following case, I think, is equally, if not more, remarkable:--
The Right Hon. Thomas Berry Cusack-Smith, brother of the present Sir Michael Cusack-Smith, Bart., is Master of the Rolls in Ireland, having been appointed to that high office in January, 1846. His father, Sir William Cusack-Smith, second baronet, was for many years Baron of the Court of Exchequer in Ireland. And his grandfather, the Right Hon. Sir Michael Smith, first baronet, was, like his grandson at the present day, Master of the Rolls in Ireland.
Is not this "a case of rare succession in the annals of the law, and not easily matched?"
ABHBA.
{385}
_Derivation of "Topsy Turvy."_--When things are in confusion they are generally said to be turned "topsy turvy." The expression is derived from a way in which turf for fuel is placed to dry on its being cut. The surface of the ground is pared off with the heath growing on it, and the heath is turned downward, and left some days in that state that the earth may get dry before it is carried away. It means then top-side-turf-way.
CLERICUS RUSTICUS.
_Dictionaries and Encyclopaedias._--Allow me to offer a suggestion to the publishers and compilers of dictionaries; first as to dictionaries of the language. A large class refer to these only to learn the meaning of words not familiar to them, but which may occur in reading. If the dictionaries are framed on the principle of displaying only the classical language of England, it is ten to one they will not supply the desired information. Let there be, besides classical dictionaries, glossaries which will exclude no word whatever on account of rarity, vulgarity, or technicality, but which may very well exclude those which are most familiar. As to encyclopaedias, their value is chiefly as supplements to the library; but surely no one studies anatomy, or the differential calculus, or architecture, in them, however good the treatises may be. I want a dictionary of miscellaneous subjects, such as find place more easily in an encyclopaedia than anywhere else; but why must I also purchase treatises on the higher mathematics, on navigation, on practical engineering, and the like, some of which I already may possess, others not want, and none of which are a bit the more convenient because arranged in alphabetical order in great volumes. Besides, they cannot be conveniently replaced by improved editions.
ENCYCLOPAEDICUS.
_"Mary, weep no more for me."_--There is a well-known ballad of this name, said to have been written by a Scotchman named "Low." The first verse runs thus:
"The moon had climbed the highest hill, Which rises o'er the source of Dee, And from the eastern summit sped Its silver light on tower and tree."
I find, however, amongst my papers, a fragment of a version of this same ballad, of, I assume, earlier antiquity, which so surpasses Low's ballad that the author has little to thank him for his interference. The first verse of what I take to be the original poem stands thus: