Part 3
"The Clergyman of a Town Parish, in which are several crippled persons, at present unable to attend divine worship, will feel very grateful to any gentleman or lady who will give him an old Bath chair for the use of these poor people; two blind men having offered, in this case, charitably to convey their crippled neighbours regularly to the house of God."
Surely this arrangement is not a new idea, and there is, if I mistake not, a Greek epigram that records its success in practice several hundred years ago. Can any of your readers, whose Greek is less faded than mine, refer me to the epigram?
GEO. E. FRERE.
[Probably the following epigram is the one floating in the faded memory of our correspondent:
[Greek: PHILIPPOU, hoi de ISIDÔROU.] [Greek: Pêros ho men guiois, ho d' ar' ommasin; amphoteroi de] [Greek: Eis hautous to tuchês endees êranisan,] [Greek: Tuphlos gar lipoguion epômadion baros airôn,] [Greek: Tais keinou phônais atrapon ôrthobatei,] [Greek: Panta de taut' edidaxe pikrê pantolmos anankê,] [Greek: Allêlois merisai toullipes eis eleon.] _Anthologia, in usum Scholæ Westmonast._: Oxon. 1724, p. 58.]
_Translations from Æschylus._--Whose translation of the tragedies of Æschylus is that which accompanies Flaxman's compositions from the same? I ought to state that there is merely a line or two under each plate, to explain the subject of each composition, and that my copy is the unreduced size.
H.
Kingston-on-Thames.
[The lines are taken from N. Potter's translation of the Tragedies of Æschylus, 4to., 1777.]
_Prince Memnon's Sister._--Who was Prince Memnon's sister, alluded to by Milton in _Il Penseroso_?
J. W. T.
Dewsbury.
[Dunster has the following note on this line:--"Prince Memnon's sister; that is, an Ethiopian princess, or sable beauty. Memnon, king of Ethiopia, being an auxiliary of the Trojans, was slain by Achilles. (See Virg. _Æn._ I. 489., '_Nigri_ Memnonis arma.') It does not, however, appear that Memnon had any sister. Tithonus, according to Hesiod, had by Aurora only two sons, Memnon and Emathion, _Theog._ 984. This lady is a creation of the poet."]
_"Oh! for a blast," &c._--Who was the author of the couplet--
"Oh! for a blast of that dread horn, On Fontarabian echoes borne?"
A. J. DUNKIN.
[The lines--
"O for the voice of that wild horn, On Fontarabia's echoes borne, The dying hero's call,"--
are by Sir Walter Scott, and form part of those which excited the horror of the father of Frank Osbaldiston, when he examined his waste-book in search of _Reports outward and inward_--Corn Debentures, &c. See _Rob Roy_, chap. ii. p. 24. ed. 1829.]
_Robin Hood's Festival._--Can any of your correspondents refer me to a good account of the festival of Robin Hood, which was so popular with our ancestors, that Bishop Latimer could get no one to come to hear him preach on that day?
In the churchwardens' accounts of St. Helens, Abingdon, published in the first volume of the _Archæologia_, there is an entry in 1566 of the sum of 18d. paid for "setting up Robin Hood's Bower."
R. W. B.
[The best account of Robin Hood's festival on the first and succeeding days of May is given in _Robin Hood: a Collection of all the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, relative to that celebrated Outlaw_; [by Joseph Ritson], among the notes and illustrations in vol. i. pp. xcvii--cx. Consult also _A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode_, by John Matthew Gutch, vol. i. pp. 60--64.; and George Soane's _New Curiosities of Literature_, vol. i. pp. 231--236.]
_Church in Suffolk._--In restoring a church in Suffolk, apparently of the date of Henry VII., except two Norman doors, the walls were found full of Norman mouldings of about 1100, or not much after. Will you kindly give me a list of the works where I may be likely to find an account of this original church? Davy and Jermyn's _Suffolk_, in the British Museum, says nothing about it. The two Norman doors are universally admired, and the church is now Norman still throughout. In the reconstruction of about 1100, the two doors do not seem to have been in any way restored or meddled with.
G. L.
[Our correspondent may probably find some account of this church either in Suckling's _Antiquities of Suffolk_, 4to., 2 vols., Gage's _History of Suffolk_ (Thingoe Hundred), 4to., or in H. Jermyn's Collections for a General History of Suffolk, in the British Museum, Add. MSS. 8168--8196.]
* * * * *
{623}
Replies.
CHILDREN CALLED IMPS.
(Vol. viii., p. 443.)
"Heere resteth the bodye of the noble Impe, Robert of Duddeley, Baron of Denbigh, sonne of Robert, Earle of Leicester, nephew and heire unto Ambrose, Earle of Warwick, brethren, both sonnes of the mighty Prince John, late Duke of Northumberland, that was cosin and heire to Sir John Grey, Vicount L'Isle, nephew and heire unto the Lady Margaret, Countesse of Shrewsbury, the eldest daughter and coheire of the noble Earle of Warr: Sir Richard Beauchampe here interred; a childe of great parentage, but of farr greater hope and towardnesse, taken from this transitory unto everlasting life in his tender age, at Wanstead in Essex, on Sunday, 19th of July, in the yeare of our Lord God 1584, being the 26th yeare of the happy raine of the most virtuous and godly Princesse, Queene Elizabeth, and in this place layd up among his noble auncestors, in assured hope of the generall resurrection."--_Lady's Chapel, St. Mary's Church, Warwick._
H. B.
Warwick.
An inscription on a tomb at Besford, near Pershore, Worcestershire, of the same period as that at Aylesbury (mentioned by MR. BROOKS), contains also the word _imp_. The tomb at Besford is a most singular one, consisting of two large folding doors fixed against the wall, their panels and the interior being painted over with figures and inscriptions. From the latter, which are of some length, the following extracts will be sufficient to illustrate the subject:
"An _impe_ entombed heere doth lie."
"... elder ... from Christ to straie, When such an _impe_ foreshewes the waie."
The old poetical word _sugared_, "Noe sugred word," occurs in the inscription.
The "impe" is supposed to be Richard Harewell, who died in 1576, aged 15 years, to whom a second monument, of alabaster (close by the former), was also erected; a rare circumstance, I should suppose. The Harewells appear to have been a family at the time of the Conquest; the two following lines are a part of one of the inscriptions:
"Of Harewell's blodde ere Conquest made, Knowne to descende of gentle race."
Nash, in his _History of Worcestershire_, makes mention of this singular monument, but is anything but correct in giving its inscriptions.
CUTHBERT BEDE, B. A.
T. W. D. BROOKS will find this word used by some modern authors to denote a child. In _Moral and Sacred Poetry_, selected and arranged by the Rev. T. Willcocks and the Rev. T. Horton (Devonport, W. Byers, 1834), there is at p. 254. a piece by Baillie, addressed "To a Child," the first line of which runs thus:
"Whose _imp_ art thou, with dimpled cheek?"
And in a poem by Rogers, on the following page, the children of a gipsy are called _imps_.
J. W. N. KEYS.
Plymouth.
* * * * *
THE DIVINING ROD.
(Vol. viii., pp. 293. 479.)
The inclosed extract from a letter which I have just received from a friend on the subject of the divining rod, will probably interest your readers as an answer to a Query which appeared some weeks ago in your excellent work. You may entirely rely on the accuracy of the facts stated.
J. A. H.
"However the pretended effect of the divining rod may be attributed to knavery and credulity by philosophers who will not take the trouble of witnessing and investigating the operation, any one who will pay a visit to the Mendip Hills in Somersetshire, and the country round their base, may have abundant proof of the efficacy of it. Its success has been very strikingly proved along the range of the Pennard Hills also, to the South of the Mendip. The faculty of discovering water by means of the divining rod is not possessed by every one; for indeed there are but few who possess it in any considerable degree, or in whose hands the motion of the rod, when passing over an underground stream, is very decided; and they who have it are quite unconscious of their capability until they are made aware of it by experiment.
"I saw the operation of the rod, or rather of a fork, formed of the shoots of the last year, held in the hands of the experimentor by the extremities, with the angle projecting before him. When he came over the spot beneath which the water flowed, the rod, which had before been perfectly still, writhed about with considerable force, so that the holder could not keep it in its former position; and he appealed to the bystanders to notice that he had made no motion to produce this effect, and used every effort to prevent it. The operation was several times repeated with the same result, and each time under the close inspection of shrewd and doubting, if not incredulous, observers. Forks of any kind of green wood served equally well, but those of dead wood had no effect. The experimentor had discovered water, in several instances, in the same parish (Pennard), but was perfectly unaware of his capability till he was requested by his landlord to try. The operator had the reputation of a perfectly honest man, whose word might be safely {624} trusted, and who was incapable of attempting to deceive any one--as indeed appeared by his open and ingenuous manner and conversation on this occasion. He was a farmer, and respected by all his neighbours. So general is the conviction of the efficacy of the divining rod in discovering both water and the ores of calamine or zinc all over the Mendip, that the people are quite astonished when any doubt is expressed about it. The late Dr. Hutton wrote against the pretension, as one of many instances of deception founded upon gross ignorance and credulity; when a lady of quality, who herself possessed the faculty, called upon him, and gave him experimental proof, in the neighbourhood of Woolwich, that water was discoverable by that means. This Dr. Hutton afterwards publicly acknowledged.
"The above I suppose will suffice for your present purpose; I could, however, say a great deal more, for I wrote a very long account many years ago to our friend ----, of what I have now only briefly stated. That letter was treated by certain scientific friends of his with contempt; but when I afterwards saw poor Dr. Turner, he said he would go down to Somerset to see it himself; but alas! he did not live to carry his intention into effect."
* * * * *
CHANGE OF MEANING IN PROVERBIAL EXPRESSIONS, ETC.
(Vol. viii., pp. 464, 465.)
Very hesitatingly I venture to express dissent from MR. KEIGHTLEY'S ingenious suggestion of a change of meaning in the proverb "Tread on a worm and it will turn." I support my dissent, however, by the following lines from Shakspeare:
"Who 'scapes the lurking serpent's mortal sting? Not he that sets his foot upon her back. The smallest worm will turn, being trodden on; And doves will peck in safe-guard of their brood." Third Part of _King Henry VI._, Act II. Sc. 2.
King Henry says, Withhold revenge, dear God!
Clifford replies, The lion, the bear, the serpent, the smallest worm, and doves, if injured, will make an effort at revenge or defence. It is clear that Shakspeare uses the word _worm_ as meaning, not a venomous serpent, but the most defenceless of reptiles.
Again, I do not think that MR. KEIGHTLEY'S quotation from Schiller's _Wallenstein's Tod_ supports his view. I am not a German scholar, but I find that the translator of _Wallenstein's Tod_ (I believe Lord Ellesmere) has translated or paraphrased the lines quoted by MR. KEIGHTLEY as follows:
"But nature gave the very worm a sting, When trampled on by man, to turn again."
The sense of the passage (spoken by Butler) requires that "wurm" should be understood to mean a harmless despised reptile, not a venomous serpent.
It seems that Schiller had Shakspeare in his mind when he wrote the lines in question; indeed, they are almost a copy of Shakspeare's line. I consider them as parallel passages.
It may not be irrelevant to observe that _worm_ in some places still means a serpent; but I believe it has usually a prefix, as "hag-worm" in Westmoreland and the West Riding of Yorkshire; so also in the latter "slow-worm" means a species of small snake or viper found on some of the moors. (For "slow-worm," see "N. & Q.," Vol. viii., pp. 33. and 479.) I have been told that "blind-worm" in Surrey means a viper. I conclude with a Query, Does _Wurm_ in modern German ever mean a serpent?
F. W. J.
"To put a spoke in one's wheel," is not singular in its _double entendre_ (Vol. viii., pp. 262. 351. 464.). "There is no love lost between them" is in a similar predicament. We now speak of no love being lost between A. and B., when we would intimate that the warmth of their mutual affection may be accurately represented by 32° Fahrenheit. That this has not always been the meaning of the phrase, the following verse from the old ballad of _The Children in the Wood_ will testify:
"Sore sick he was, and like to die, No help that he could have; His wife by him as sick did lie, And both possess'd one grave. _No love between these two was lost_, Each was to other kind; In love they lived, in love they died, And left two babes behind."
R. PRICE.
St. Ives.
* * * * *
SNEEZING.
(Vol. viii., p. 366.)
A collection of "facts, theories, and popular ideas" upon this subject would fill a volume. I send, however, a few extracts, &c., which may interest your correspondent MEDICUS:
"Et n'esternuay point regardant le soleil."
"And did not sneeze as he looked upon the sun." Ronsard, tom. v. p. 158., quoted in Southey's _Common Place Book_, 3rd series, p. 303.
Here, not to sneeze appears to be looked on as an ill omen.
Ammianus has an epigram upon one whose nose was so long that he never heard it sneeze, and therefore never said [Greek: Zeu sôson], God bless.--_Notes on the Variorum Plautus_ (ed. Gronov., Lugd. Bat.), p. 720. {625}
Athenæus, says Potter in his _Archæologia Græca_, proves that the head was esteemed holy, because it was customary to swear by it, and adore as holy the sneezes that proceeded from it. And Aristotle tells us in express terms that sneezing was accounted a deity: "[Greek: Ton Ptarmon theon hêgoumetha]"--_Archæol. Græc._ (5th ed.), p. 338.
"Oscitatio in nixu letalis est, sicut Sternuisse a coitu abortivum." Quoted from Pliny by Aulus Gellius, _Noct. Att._ III. xvi. 24.
Erasmus, in his _Colloquies_, bids one say to him who sneezes, "Sit faustum ac felix," or "Servet te Deus," or "Sit salutiferum" or "Bene vertat Deus."
"Quare homines sternutant?
"Respondetur, ut virtus expulsiva et visiva, per hoc purgetur, et cerebrum a sua superfluitate purgetur, etc. Etiam qui sternutat frequenter, dicitur habere forte cerebrum."--_Aristotelis Problemata_: Amstelodami, anno 1690.
Query whether from some such idea of the beneficial effect of sneezing, arose the practice of calling for the divine blessing on the sneezer?
When Themistocles was offering sacrifice, it happened that three beautiful captives were brought him, and at the same time the fire burnt clear and bright, and a sneeze happened on the right hand. Hereupon Euphrantides the soothsayer, embracing him, predicted the memorable victory which was afterwards obtained by him, &c.
There is also mention of this custom (the observation of sneezing) in Homer, who has introduced Penelope rejoicing at a sneeze of her son Telemachus:
"[Greek: Ouch horaas ho moi huios epeptaren]"
Sneezing was not always a lucky omen, but varied according to the alteration of circumstances--"[Greek: Tôn ptarmôn hoi men eisin ôphelimoi, hoi de blaberoi]," "Some sneezes are profitable, others prejudicial"--according to the scholiast upon the following passage of Theocritus, wherein he makes the sneezing of the Cupids to have been an unfortunate omen to a certain lover:
"[Greek: Simichida men erôtes epeptaron.]"
If any person sneezed between midnight and the following noontide it was fortunate, but from noontide till midnight it was unfortunate.
If a man sneezed at the table while they were taking away, or if another happened to sneeze upon his left hand, it was unlucky; if on the right hand, fortunate.
If, in the undertaking any business, two or four sneezes happened, it was a lucky omen, and gave encouragement to proceed; if more than four, the omen was neither good nor bad; if one or three, it was unlucky, and dehorted them from proceeding in what they had designed. If two men were deliberating about any business, and both of them chanced to sneeze together, it was a prosperous omen.--_Archæol. Græc._ (5th ed.), pp. 339, 340.
FRANCIS JOHN SCOTT.
Tewkesbury.
The custom your correspondent MEDICUS alludes to, of wishing a person "good health," after sneezing, is also very common in Russia. The phrases the Russians use on these occasions are--"To your good health!" or "How do you do?"
J. S. A.
Old Broad Street.
* * * * *
BOOKS BURNED BY THE COMMON HANGMAN.
(Vol. viii., pp. 272. 346.)
To the list of these literary _auto da fé's_ we may well add the burning of Bishop Burnet's famous _Pastoral Letter_, which was censured by the House of Commons, January, 1692, and was burned by the common hangman. The offence contained in it was the ascribing the title of William III. to the crown of England to a right of conquest. A recollection of this gives additional point to the irony of Atterbury in attacking Wake:
"William the Conqueror is another of the pious patterns he recommends, 'who would suffer nothing,' he says, 'to be determined in any ecclesiastical causes without leave and authority first had from him.'... His present majesty is not William the Conqueror; and can no more by our constitution rule absolutely either in Church or State than he would if he could: his will and pleasure is indeed a law to all his subjects; not in a conquering sense, but because his will and pleasure is only that the laws of our country should be obeyed, which he came over on purpose to rescue, and counts it his great prerogative to maintain; and contemns therefore, I doubt not, such sordid flattery as would measure the extent of his supremacy from the Conqueror's claim."--Atterbury's _Rights, Powers, and Privileges of Convocation_, pp. 158--160.
Atterbury never misses a hit at Burnet when he can conveniently administer one, and the Bishop endeavours to smile even while he winces:
"He writes with just and due respect of the king and the present constitution. This has come so seldom from that corner that it ought to be the more considered. I will not give that scope to jealousy as to suspect that this was an artifice; but accept it sincerely," &c.--The Bishop of Sarum's _Reflections on the Rights, Powers, &c._. p. 4.
W. FRASER.
Tor-Mohun.
The following, may come under the list wanted by BALLIOLENSIS:
"The covenant itself, together with the act for erecting the high court of justice, that for subscribing the engagement, and that for declaring England a {626} Commonwealth, were ordered to be burned by the hands of the hangman. The people assisted with great alacrity on this occasion."--From Hume, Reign of Charles II., edit. London, 1828, p. 762.
On a copy of _La Défense de la Réformation, &c_., par I. Claude, à La Haye, 1683, I noted the following about thirty years ago as a striking passage, but cannot now recollect from whence I took it. This book was condemned by the Pope to be burned, on which circumstance the editor of an old edition of it very appositely observes:
"Books have souls as well as men, which survive their martyrdom, and are not burnt, but crowned by the flames that encircle them. The Church of Rome has quickly felt there was nothing combustible but the paper. The truth flew upward like the angel from Manoah's sacrifice, untouched by the fire, and unsullied by the smoke, and found a safe refuge at the footstool of the God of Truth."
G. N.
* * * * *
JEWS IN CHINA.
(Vol. viii., p. 515.)
The only people known as descendants of any of the ten tribes are the Spomerim, or Samaritans; whose chief peculiarity is, that they acknowledge as sacred only the five books of Moses: for, although other books held sacred by the Jews are known to them, such books are not written in the same ancient alphabetic character as those of the Samaritan Pentateuch. The ten tribes were then taken captive B.C. 721 (2 Kings xvii. 24--41.). The inference is, therefore, that all the books, from Joshua to Malachi inclusive, had not been composed or admitted into the holy canon till after that date. The criterion then for ascertaining whether the Chinese Jews are descended from the ten tribes, appears to be their adherence to the Pentateuch _alone_ as sacred. I. The Chinese Jews have not the ancient Hebrew character, but the comparatively modern square Chaldee one, as in our printed Bibles. II. Gozani states that the Jews of Kaafung Foo, in Honan, had some traditions from the Talmud. The Mishnah, constituting the text of the Talmud, is manifestly a compilation _subsequent_ to the closing of the Jewish canon; the quotations from the books following those of Moses being constantly in use therein. III. On Gozani mentioning Jesus the Messiah, the Chinese Jew said they had a knowledge of Jesus the son of Sirach. As, however, the book of the last-named writer is unknown in Hebrew, Gozani, who was ignorant of that language, may have mistaken him for Jesus (=Joshua) the son of Nun, with which book the Chinese Jew was acquainted.[3] In either case, _more_ books than the Pentateuch were undoubtedly held sacred by these Chinese Jews; therefore the connexion with the ten tribes (house of Israel), as distinct from the house of Judah (the Jews properly so called), cannot be inferred. The authorities for the Samaritans are Scaliger, Ludolf, Prideaux, Jahn, Huntington, Winer, Schnurrer, and Kitto. For the eastern Jews: Josephus, Peritsol, Manasseh, Basnage, Büsching; Fathers Ricci, Aleni, Gozani, and other Jesuits, in the _Lettres édifiantes et curieuses_, vol. xviii.; and the _Chinese Repository_, vol. i. pp. 8. 44., vol. iii. p. 175.
Circumcision is too general a practice in the hotter regions of the south and east, to permit such practice to be deemed proof of Jewish descent, unless corroborated by other customs peculiar to the Jews. Besides the physiological characteristics of the native Australians preclude us from deducing their natural descent from either the _Jews_ or the ten tribes.
T.J. BUCKTON.
Lichfield.
[Footnote 3: The opprobrious name of Christ amongst the Jews is Jesus son of Sadta, which Gozani may have mistaken for Sirach; indeed,--the Chinese pronunciation of Hebrew is quite peculiar, as they cannot pronounce, for instance, the letters _b_, _r_, _th_, naming them respectively _p_, _l_, _z_.]
* * * * *
POETICAL TAVERN SIGNS.
(Vol. viii., pp. 242. 452.)
I made a note of the following specimen of poetical tavern sign, in one of Mr. Mark Lemon's Supplements to _The Illustrated London News_ (Dec. 27, 1851). I here transcribe it to add to MR. WARDE'S collection: