Chapter 2

"The great and unrivalled attraction was the personification of Bailie Jarvie by Charles Mackay, who, being himself a native of Glasgow, entered into the minutest peculiarities of the character with high _gusto_, and gave the west country dialect in its most racy perfection."

But in the sweetest cup of praise, there is generally one small drop of bitterness. The drop, in honest Mackay's case, is that by calling him a "native of Glasgow," and, therefore, "to the manner born," he is, by implication, deprived of the credit of speaking the "foreign tongue" like a native. So after wearing his laurels for a quarter of a century with this one withered leaf in them, he has plucked it off, and by a formal affidavit sworn before an Edinburgh bailie, the Glasgow bailie has put it on record that he is really by birth "one of the same class whom King Jamie denominated a real Edinburgh Gutter-Bluid." If there is something droll in the notion of such an affidavit, there is, assuredly, something to move our respect in the earnestness and love of truth which led the bailie to make it, and to prove him a good honest man, as we have no doubt, "his father, the deacon, was before him."

EFFESSA.

_Camels in Gaul._--The use of camels by the Franks in Gaul is more than once referred to by the chroniclers. In the year 585, the treasures of Mummolus and the friends of Gondovald were carried from Bordeaux to Convennes on camels. The troops of Gontran who were pursuing them--

"invenerunt _camelos_ cum ingenti pondere auri atque argenti, sive equos quos fessos per vias reliquerat"--_Greg. Turon._, l. vii. c. 35.

And after Brunichild had fallen into the hands of Chlotair, she was, before her death, conducted through the army on a camel:--

"Jubetque eam _camelum_ per omnem exercitum sedentem perducere."--_Fredegarius_, c. 42.

By what people were camels first brought into Gaul? By the Romans; by the Visigoths; or by the Franks themselves?

R.J.K.

* * * * *

QUERIES.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL QUERIES.

(_Continued from page 325._)

(13.) Is it not a grievous and calumnious charge against the principal libraries of England, Germany, and France, that not one of them contains a copy of the _Florentine Pandects_, in three folio {422} volumes, "magnifice, ac pereleganter, perque accurate impressis," as Fabricius speaks? (_Bibl. Græc._ xii: 363.) This statement, which may be but a libel, is found in Tilgner (_Nov. lib. rar. Collect._ Fascic. iv. 710.), Schelhorn (_Amæn. Lit._ iii. 428.), Vogt (_Catal._ p. 562. Hamb. 1738), and Solger (_Biblioth._ i 163.). According to the last writer, the edition in question, Florent. 1553, (for a fac-simile of the letters of the original MS. see Mabillon's _Iter Italicum_, p. 183.) is,--"splendidissima, et stupendæ raritatis, quæ in tanta est apud Eruditos æstimatione ut pro 100 Imperialibus sæpius divendita fuerit." Would that the race of such purchasers was not extinct! In Gibbon's notice of this impression (_Decline and Fall_, iv. 197. ed. Milman), there are two mistakes. He calls the editor "Taurellus" instead of _Taurellius_; and makes the date "1551", when it should have been 1553. These errors, however, are scarcely surprising in a sentence in which Antonius Augustinus is named "Antoninus." The Archbishop of Tarragona had received a still more exalted title in p. 193., for there he was styled "Antoninus Augustus." Are these the author's faults, or are they merely editorial embellishments?

(14.) In what year was the improved woodcut of the _Prelum Ascensianum_ used for the first time? And has it been observed that the small and separated figures incised on the legs of this _insigne_ of Jodocus Badius may sometimes be taken as a safe guide with reference to the exact date of the works in which this mark appears? As an argument serving to justify the occasional adoption of this criterion I would adduce the fact, that the earliest edition of Budæus _De Contemptu Rerum fortuitarum_ is believed to have been printed in 1520 (Greswell's _Parisian Greek Press_, i. 39.), and this year is accordingly visible in the title-page on the print of the _Prelum Ascensianum_. That recourse must, however, be had with caution to this method of discovering a date, is manifest; from the circumstance, that 1521, or perhaps I should say an injured 1520, appears on the Badian Device in the third impression of the same treatise (the second with the _expositio_), though it was set forth "postridie Cal. April 1528."

(15.) Is it owing to the extreme rarity of copies of the first edition of the Pagninian version of the Scriptures that so many writers are perplexed and ignorant concerning it? One might have expected that such a very remarkable impression in all respects would have been so well known to Bishop Walton, that he could not have asserted (_Proleg._ v.) that it was published in 1523; and the same hallucination is perceptible in the _Elenchus Scriptorum_ by Crowe (p. 4.) It is certain that Pope Leo X. directed that Pagnini's translation should be printed at his expense (Roscoe, ii. 282.), and the Diploma of Adrian VI. is dated "die, xj. Maij. M.D.XXIII.," but the labours of the eminent Dominican were not put forth until the 29th of January, 1527. This is the date in the colophon; and though "1528" is obvious on the title-page, the apparent variation may be accounted for by remembering the several ways of marking the commencement of the year. (_Le Long_, by Masch, ii. 475.; _Chronol. of Hist._, by Sir H. Nicolas, p. 40.) Chevillier informs us (_Orig. de l'Imp._ p. 143.) that the earliest Latin Bible, in which he had seen the verses distinguished by ciphers, was that of Robert Stephens in 1557. Clement (_Biblioth._ iv. 147.) takes notice of an impression issued two years previously; and these bibliographers have been followed by Greswell (_Paris. G. P._ i. 342. 390.). Were they all unacquainted with the antecedent exertions of Sante Pagnini (See Pettigrew's _Bibl. Sussex._ p. 388.)

(16.) Why should Panzer have thought that the true date of the _editio princeps_ of Gregorius Turonensis and Ado Viennensis, comprised in the same small folio volume, was 1516? (Greswell, i. 35.) If he had said 1522, he might have had the assistance of a misprint in the colophon, in which "M.D.XXII." was inserted instead of M.D.XII.; but the royal privilege for the book is dated, "le douziesme iour de mars lan _milcinqcens et onze_," and the dedication of the works by Badius to Guil. Parvus ends with "Ad. XII Kalendas Decemb. Anni huius M.D.XII."

(17.) Who was the author of _Peniteas cito_? And is it not evident that the impression at Cologne by Martinus de Werdena, in 1511, is considerably later than that which is adorned on the title-page with a different woodcut, and which exhibits the following words proceeding from the teacher: "Accipies tanti doctoris dogmata sancta?"

R.G.

* * * * *

DRYDEN'S "ESSAY UPON SATIRE."

On what evidence does the statement rest, that the Earl of Mulgrave was the author of the _Essay upon Satire_, and that Dryden merely corrected and polished it? As at present advised, I have considerable doubt upon the point: and although, in modern editions of Dryden's _Works_, I find it headed _An Essay upon Satire, written by Mr. Dryden and the Earl of Mulgrave_, yet in the _State Poems_, vol. i. p. 179., originally printed in the lifetime of Dryden, it is attributed solely to him--"_An Essay upon Satyr._ By J. Dryden, Esq." This gets rid of the assertion in the note of "D.," in the Aldine edition of Dryden (i. 105.), that "the Earl of Mulgrave's name has been _always_ joined with Dryden's, as concerned in the composition." Was it not first published without notice that any other person was concerned in it but Dryden?

The internal evidence, too, is strong that Dryden was the author of it. I do not here refer to the {423} free, flexible, and idiomatic character of the versification, so exactly like that of Dryden; but principally to the description the _Essay upon Satire_ contains of the Earl of Mulgrave himself, beginning,

"Mulgrave had much ado to scape the snare, Though learn'd in those ill arts that cheat the fair; For, after all, his vulgar marriage mocks, With beauty dazzled Numps was in the stocks;"

And ending:

"Him no soft thoughts, no gratitude could move; To gold he fled, from beauty and from love," &c.

Could Mulgrave have so written of himself; or could he have allowed Dryden to interpolate the character. Earlier in the poem we meet with a description of Shaftesbury, which cannot fail to call to mind Dryden's character of him in _Absalom and Achitophel_; which, as we know, did not make its appearance, even in its first shape, until two years after Dryden was cudgelled in Rose Street as _the author_ of the _Essay upon Satire_. Everybody bears in mind the triplet,

"A fiery soul, which working out its way, Fretted his pigmy body to decay, And o'er-inform'd the tenement of clay;"

And what does Dryden (for it must be he who writes) say of Shaftesbury in the _Essay upon Satire_?

"As by our little Machiavel we find, That nimblest creature of the busy kind: His limbs are crippled, and his body shakes, Yet his hard mind, which all this bustle makes, No pity on its poor companion takes."

If Mulgrave wrote these lines, and Dryden only corrected them, Dryden was at all events indebted to Mulgrave for the thought of the inequality, and disproportion between the mind and body of Shaftesbury. Moreover, we know that Pope expunged the assertion subsequently made, that Dryden had been "punished" (not _beaten_, as "D." quotes the passage) "for another's rhimes," when he was bastinadoed, in 1679, at the instigation of Rochester, for the character of him in the _Essay upon Satire_.

It might suit Mulgrave's purpose afterwards to claim a share in this production; but the evidence, as far as I am acquainted with it, seems all against it. There may be much evidence on the point with which I am not acquainted, and perhaps some of your readers will be so good as to point it out to me. The question is one that I am, at this moment, especially interested in.

THE HERMIT OF HOLYPORT.

* * * * *

MINOR QUERIES.

_Æneas Silvius (Pope Pius II.)._--A broadsheet was published in 1461, containing the excommunication and dethronement of the Archbishop and Elector Dietrich of Mayence, issued and styled in the most formidable terms by _Pius II._ This broadsheet, consisting of eighteen lines, and printed on one side only, appears from the uniformity of its type with the _Rationale_ of 1459, to be the product of _Fust_ and _Schöffer_.

No mention whatever is made of this typographical curiosity in any of the standard bibliographical manuals, from which it seems, that this broadsheet is UNIQUE. Can any information, throwing light upon this subject, be given?

QUERIST.

November, 1850.

"_Please the Pigs_" is a phrase too vulgarly common not to be well known to your readers. But whence has it arisen? Either in "NOTES AND QUERIES," or elsewhere, it has been explained as a corruption of "Please the _pix_." Will you allow another suggestion? I think it possible that the pigs of the Gergesenes (Matthew viii. 28. _et seq._) may be those appealed to, and that the invocation may be of somewhat impious meaning. John Bradford, the martyr of 1555, has within a few consecutive pages of his writings the following expressions:

"And so by this means, as they save their pigs, which they would not lose, (I mean their worldly pelf), so they would please the Protestants, and be counted with them for gospellers, yea, marry, would they."--_Writings of Bradford_, Parker Society ed., p.390.

Again:

"Now are they willing to drink of God's cup of afflictions, which He offereth common with His son Christ our Lord, lest they should love their pigs with the Gergenites." p. 409.

Again:

"This is a hard sermon: 'Who is able to abide it?' Therefore, Christ must be prayed to depart, lest all their pigs be drowned. The devil shall have his dwelling again in themselves, rather than in their pigs." p. 409.

These, and similar expressions in the same writer, without reference to any text upon the subject, seem to show, that men loving their pigs more than God, was a theological phrase of the day, descriptive of their too great worldliness. Hence, just as St. Paul said, "if the Lord will," or as we say, "please God," or, as it is sometimes written, "D.V.," worldly men would exclaim, "please the pigs," and thereby mean that, provided it suited their present interest, they would do this or that thing.

ALFRED GATTY.

Ecclesfield.

[We subjoin the following Query, as one so closely connected with the foregoing, that the explanation of the one will probably clear up the obscurity in which the other is involved.]

{424} _To save One's Bacon._--Can you or any of your correspondents inform me of the origin of the common saying, "He's just saved his bacon?" It has puzzled me considerably, and I really can form no conjecture why "bacon" should be the article "saved."

C.H.M.

_Arabic Numerals._--I should be glad to know something about the projected work of Brugsh, Berlin, referred to in Vol. ii., p. 294.,--its size and price.

J.W.H.

_Cardinal._--"_Never did Cardinal bring good to England._"--We read in Dr. Ligard's _History_ (vol. iv. p. 527.), on the authority of Cavendish, that when the Cardinals Campeggio and Wolsey adjourned the inquiry into the legality of Henry VIII.'s marriage with Catharine of Arragon, "the Duke of Suffolk, striking the table, exclaimed with vehemence, that the 'old saw' was now verified,--'Never did Cardinal bring good to England.'" I should be glad to know if this saying is to be met with elsewhere, and what gave rise to it?

O.P.Q.

"_By the bye," &c._--What is the etymology of the phrases "by the bye," "by and by," and such like?

J.R.N.

_Poisons._--Our ancestors believed in the existence of poisons made so artfully that they did not operate till several years after they were administered. I should be greatly obliged by any information on this subject obtained from English books published previously to 1600.

M.

_Cabalistic Author._--Who was the author of a chemical and cabalistical work, not noticed by Lowndes, entitled:

"A philosophicall epitaph in hierogliphicall figures. A briefe of the golden calf (the world's idol). The golden ass well managed, and Midas restored to reason. Written by J. Rod, Glauber, and Jehior, the three principles or originall of all things. Published by W.C., Esquire, 8vo. Lond. Printed for William Cooper, at the Pellican, in Little Britain, 1673."

With a long catalogue of chemical books, in three parts, at the end. My copy has two titles, the first being an engraved one, with ten small circles round it, containing hieroglyphical figures, and an engraved frontispiece, which is repeated in the volume, with some other cuts. There are two dedications, one to Robert Boyle, Esq., and the other to Elias Ashmole, Esq.; both signed "W.C. or twice five hundred," which signature is repeated in other parts of the book. What is the meaning of "W.C. or twice five hundred"?

T. CR.

_Brandon the Juggler._--Where is any information to be obtained of Brandon the Juggler, who lived in the reign of King Henry VIII.?

T. CR.

_Jacobus Præfectus Siculus._--I have a beautiful copy of a poem by this person, entitled _De Verbo DEI Cantica_. The binding expresses its date: "Neapoli, 1537." It is not, I believe, the work which suggested to Milton his greater songs, though it is a pretty complete outline of the _Paradise Lost_ and _Regained_/ What is known about the author, or any other works of his?

J.W.H.

_The Word "after" in the Rubric--Canons of 1604._--

1. Can any of your correspondents who may have in their possession any old Greek, or Latin, or other versions, of the Book of Common Prayer, kindly inform me how the word _after_ is rendered in the rubrics of the General Confession, the Lord's Prayer in the Post Communion, and the last prayer of the Commination Service? Is it in the sense of _post_ or _secundum_?

2. Where can any account of the translation of the Canons of 1604 into English be found? It is apprehended the question is one more difficult to answer than might be supposed.

T.Y.

_Hard by._--Is not _hard by_ a corruption of the German _hierbei_? I know no other similar instance of the word _hard_, that is to say, as signifying _proximity_, without the conjoint idea of _pressure_ or _pursuit._

K.

_Thomas Rogers of Horninger._--Can any of the readers of your valuable publication give me, or put me in the way of obtaining, any information about one Thomas Rogers, who was in some way connected with the village of Horninger or Horringer, near Bury St. Edmunds, was author of a work on the Thirty-nine Articles, and died in the year 1616?

S.G.

Corpus Christi Col., Cambridge.

_Armorial Bearings._--Three barrulets charged with six church bells, three, two, and one, is a shield occurring in the Speke Chauntry, in Exeter Cathedral. Can this coat be assigned?

J.W.H.

_Lady Compton's Letter to her Husband._--In Bishop Goodman's _Court of King James I.,_ edited by John S. Brewer, M.A. (vol. ii. p. 127..), is a letter from Lady Compton to her husband, William Lord Compton, afterwards Earl of Northampton, written upon occasion of his coming into possession of a large fortune. This letter, with some important variations, is also given in Knight's _London_ (vol. i. p. 324.), and, if my memory does not deceive me, in Hewitt's _Visits to Remarkable Places_. This letter is very curious, but I can hardly think it genuine. Can any of your correspondents throw any light on the matter? Was it printed before 1839, when Mr. Brewer's work appeared? Where is the original, or supposed original, to be seen? Above all, is it authentic? If not, is it known when, and by {425} whom, and under what circumstances it was written?

C.H. COOPER.

Cambridge, November 15. 1850.

_Romagnasi's Works._--In a "Life of G.D. Romagnasi," in vol. xviii. _Law Mag._, p. 340., after enumerating several of his works, it is added, "All these are comprised in a single volume, Florentine edit. of 1835." I have in vain endeavoured to procure the work, and have recently received an answer from the first book establishment in Florence, to the effect that no such edition ever appeared either at Florence or elsewhere.

This is strange after the explicit statement in the _Law Mag._, and I shall be obliged to receive through the medium of your useful pages any information regarding the work in question.

F.R.H.

_Christopher Barker's Device._--I have often been puzzled to understand the precise meaning of the inscription on Christopher Barker's device. Whether this arises from my own ignorance, or from any essential difficulty in it, I cannot tell; but I should be glad of an explanation. I copy from a folio edition of the Geneva Bible, "imprinted at London by Christopher Barker, printer to the Queene's Majesty, 1578."

The device consists of a boar's head rising from a mural crown, with a scroll proceeding from its mouth, and embracing a lamb in the lowest fold. The inscription on this scroll is as follows:--

"Tigre . Reo. Animale . Del. Adam . Vecchio. Figliuolo . Merce. L'Evangelio . Fatto. N'Estat . Agnello."

I venture my own solution:--The tiger, the wicked animal, of the old Adam, being made, thanks to the Gospel, a son, is hence become a lamb."

I presume _N'Estat_ to be an abbreviation of "ne è stato." Any correction or illustration of this will oblige.

C.W. BINGHAM.

Bingham's Melcombe, Blandford.

* * * * *

REPLIES.

LICENSING OF BOOKS.

(Vol. ii., p.359.)

On the 12th November, 5 & 6 Philip and Mary, 1558, a bill "That no man shall print any book or ballad, &c., unless he be authorized thereunto by the king and queen's majesties licence, under the Great Seal of Englande," was read for the first time in the House of Lords, where it was read again a second time on the 14th. On the 16th it was read for the third time, but it did not pass, and probably never reached the Commons; for Queen Mary died on the following day, and thereby the Parliament was dissolved. (_Lords' Journal_, i. 539, 540.) Queen Elizabeth, however did by her high prerogative what her sister had sought to effect by legislative sanction. In the first year of her reign, 1559, she issued injunctions concerning both the clergy and the laity: the 51st Injunction was in the following terms:--

"Item, because there is great abuse in the printers of books, which for covetousness chiefly regard not what they print, so they may have gain, whereby ariseth the great disorder by publication of unfruitful, vain, and infamous books and papers; the queen's majesty straitly chargeth and commandeth, that no manner of person shall print any manner of book or paper, of what sort, nature, or in what language soever it be, except the same be first licensed by Her Majesty by express words in writing, or by six of her privy council; or be perused and licensed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the Bishop of London, the chancellors of both universities, the bishop being ordinary, and the archdeacon also of the place, where any such shall be printed, or by two of them, whereof the ordinary of the place to be always one. And that the names of such, as shall allow the same, to be added in the end of every such work, for a testimony of the allowance thereof. And because many pamphlets, plays, and ballads be oftentimes printed, wherein regard would be had that nothing therein should be either heretical, seditious, or unseemly for Christian ears; Her Majesty likewise commandeth that no manner of person shall enterprise to print any such, except the same be to him licensed by such Her Majesty's commissioners, or three of them, as be appointed in the city of London to hear and determine divers clauses ecclesiastical, tending to the execution of certain statutes made the last parliament for uniformity of order in religion. And if any shall sell or utter any manner of books or papers, being not licensed as is abovesaid, that the same party shall be punished by order of the said commissioners, as to the quality of the fault shall be thought meet. And touching all other books of matters of religion, or policy, or governance, that have been printed, either on this side the seas, or on the other side, because the diversity of them is great, and that there needeth good consideration to be had of the particularities thereof, Her Majesty referreth the prohibition or permission thereof to the order, which her said commissioners within the city of London shall take and notify. According to the which, Her Majesty straitly chargeth and commandeth all manner her subjects, and especially the wardens and company of stationers, to be obedient.

"Provided that these orders do not extend to any profane authors and works in any language, that have been heretofore commonly received or allowed in any of the universities or schools, but the same may be printed, and used as by good order they were accustomed."--Cardswell's _Documentary Annals_, i. 229.