Chapter 2

Then follows the evidence of Paule Renalduci, whose grandsire's grandsire saw the angels bring the house over the sea: also the evidence of Francis Prior, whose grandsire, a hunter, often saw it in the wood, and whose grandsire's grandsire had a house close by. The inscription thus terminates:--

"I, Robt. Corbington, priest of the Companie of Iesus in the zeir MDCXXXV., have treulie translated the premisses out of the Latin story hanged up in the seid kirk."

S. SMIRKE.

* * * * *

FOLK LORE.

"_Nettle in Dock out_" (Vol. iii., p. 133.).--If your correspondent will refer to _The Literary Gazette_, March 24, 1849, No. 1679., he will find that I gave precisely the same explanation of that obscure passage of Chaucer's _Troilus and Creseide_, lib. iv., in a paper which I contributed to the British Archæological Association.

FRAS. CROSSLEY.

[We will add two further illustrations of this passage of Chaucer, and the popular rhyme on which it is founded. The first is from Mr. Akerman's _Glossary of Provincial Words and Phrases in Use in Wiltshire_, where we read--

"When a child is stung, he plucks a dock-leaf, and laying it on the part affected, sings--

'Out 'ettle In dock Dock shall ha a new smock; 'Ettle zhant Ha' narrun.'"

Then follows a reference by Mr. Akerman to the passage in _Troilus and Creseide_.--Our second illustration is from Chaucer himself, who, in his _Testament of Love_ (p. 482 ed. Urry), has the following passage:

"Ye wete well Ladie eke (quoth I), that I have not plaid raket, Nettle in, Docke out, and with the weathercocke waved."

Mr. Akerman's work was, we believe, published in {206} 1846; and, at all events, attention was called to these passages in the _Athenæum_ of the l2th September in that year, No. 985.]

_Soul separates from the Body._--In Vol. ii., p. 506., is an allusion to an ancient superstition, that the human soul sometimes leaves the body of a sleeping person and takes another form; allow me to mention that I remember, some forty years ago, hearing a servant from Lincolnshire relate a story of two travellers who laid down by the road-side to rest, and one fell asleep. The other, seeing a bee settle on a neighbouring wall and go into a little hole, put the end of his staff in the hole, and so imprisoned the bee. Wishing to pursue his journey, he endeavoured to awaken his companion, but was unable to do so, till, resuming his stick, the bee flew to the sleeping man and went into his ear. His companion then awoke him, remarking how soundly he had been sleeping, and asked what had he been dreaming of? "Oh!" said he, "I dreamt that you shut me up in a dark cave and I could not awake till you let me out." The person who told me the story firmly believed that the man's soul was in the bee.

F. S.

_Lady's Trees._--In some parts of Cornwall, small branches of sea-weed, dried and fastened in turned wooden stands, are set up as ornaments on the chimney-piece, &c. The poor people suppose that they preserve the house from fire, and they are known by the name of "_Lady's trees_," in honour, I presume, of the Virgin Mary.

H. G. T.

Launceston.

_Norfolk Folk Lore Rhymes._--I have met with the rhymes following, which may not be uninteresting to some of your readers as _Folk Lore, Norfolk_:--

"Rising was, Lynn is, and Downham shall be, The greatest seaport of the three."

Another version of the same runs thus:

"Risin was a seaport town, And Lynn it was a wash, But now Lynn is a seaport Lynn, And Rising fares the worst."

Also another satirical tradition in rhyme:

"That nasty stinking sink-hole of sin, Which the map of the county denominates Lynn."

Also:

"Caistor was a city ere Norwich was none, And Norwich was built of Caistor stone."

JOHN NURSE CHADWICK.

King's Lynn.

* * * * *

Minor Notes.

_Note for the Topographers of Ancient London, and for the Monasticon._--

"Walter Grendon, Prior of the hospital of St John of Jerusalem, acknowledges to have received, by the hands of Robert Upgate and Ralph Halstede,--from Margaret, widow of S^r John Philippott K^t,--Thomas Goodlak and their partners,--4 pounds in full payment of arrears of all the rent due to us from their tenement called Jesoreshall in the city of London.

"Dated 1. December, 1406."

From the original in the Surrenden collection.

L. B. L.

_Gray and Burns._--

"Authors, before they write, should read."

So thought Matthew Prior; and if that rule had been attended to, neither would Lord Byron have deemed it worth notice that "_the knell of parting day_," in Gray's Elegy, "was adopted from Dante;" nor would Mr. Cary have remarked upon "this plagiarism," if indeed _he_ used the term. (I refer to "NOTES AND QUERIES," Vol. iii., p. 35.) The truth is, that in every good edition of Gray's _Works_, there is a note to the line in question, _by the poet himself_, expressly stating that the passage is "_an imitation of the quotation from Dante_" thus brought forward.

I could furnish you with various _notes_ on Gray, pointing out remarkable coincidences of sentiment and expression between himself and other writers; but I cannot allow _Gray_ to be a plagiary, any more than I can allow _Burns_ to be so designated, in the following instances:--

At the end of the poem called _The Vision_, we find--

"And like a passing thought she fled."

In _Hesiod_ we have--

"[Greek: ho d' eptato hôste noêma.]"--_Scut. Herc._ 222.

Again, few persons are unacquainted with Burns's lines--

"Her 'prentice han' she tried on man, An' then she made," &c.

In an old play, _Cupid's Whirligig_ (4to. 1607), we read--

"Man was made when Nature was but an apprentice, but woman when she was a skilful mistress of her art."

Pliny, in his _Natural History_, has the pretty notion that

"Nature, in learning to form a lily, turned out a convolvulus."

VARRO.

_Richard III., Traditional Notice of._--I have an aunt, now eighty-nine years of age, who in early life knew one who was in the habit of saying:

"I knew a man, who knew a man, who knew a man who danced at court in the days of Richard III."

Thus there have been but three links between one who knew Richard III. and one now alive.

My aunt's acquaintance could name his three predecessors, who were members of his own family: {207} their names have been forgotten, but his name was Harrison, and he was a member of an old Yorkshire family, and late in life settled in Bedfordshire.

Richard died in 1484, and thus five persons have sufficed to chronicle an incident which occurred nearly 370 years since.

Mr. Harrison further stated that there was nothing remarkable about Richard, that he was not the hunchback "lump of foul deformity" so generally believed until of late years.

The foregoing anecdote may be of interest as showing that traditions may come down from remote periods by few links, and thus be but little differing from the actual occurrences.

H. J. B.

66. Hamilton Terrace, St. John's Wood, March 5. 1851.

_Oliver Cromwell._--Echard says that his highness sold himself to the devil, and _that he had seen the solemn compact_. Anthony à Wood, who doubtless credited this account of a furious brother loyalist, in his Journal says:

"Aug. 30, 1658. Monday, a terrible raging wind happened, which did much damage. Dennis Bond, a great Oliverian and anti-monarchist, died on that day, and then the devil took _bond_ for Oliver's appearance."

Clarendon, assigning the Protector to eternal perdition, not liking to lose the portent, boldly says the remarkable hurricane occurred on September 3, the day of Oliver's death. Oliver's admirers, on the other hand, represent this wind as ushering him into the other world, but for a very different reason.

Heath, in his _Flagellum_ (I have the 4th edit.), says:

It pleased God to usher in his end with a great whale _some three months before_, June 2, that came up as far as Greenwich, and there was killed; and more immediately by a terrible storm of wind: the prognosticks that the great Leviathan of men, that tempest and overthrow of government, was now going to his own place!"

I have several works concerning Cromwell, but in no other do I find this story very like a whale. Would some reader of better opportunities favour us with a record of these two matters of natural history, not as connected with the death of this remarkable man, but as mere events? Your well-read readers will remember some similar tales relative to the death of Cardinal Mazarine. These exuberances of vulgar minds may partly be attributed to the credulity of the age, but more probably to the same want of philosophy which caused the ancients to deal in exaggeration.

B. B.

_Snail-eating._--The practice of _eating_, if not of talking to, snails, seems not to be so unknown in this country as some of your readers might imagine. I was just now interrogating a village child in reference to the addresses to snails quoted under the head of "FOLK LORE," Vol. iii., pp. 132. and 179., when she acquainted me with the not very appetising fact, that she and her brothers and sisters had been in the constant habit of indulging this horrible _Limacotrophy_.

"We hooks them out of the wall (she says) with a stick, in winter time, and not in summer time (so it seems they have their seasons); and we roasts them, and, when they've done spitting, they be a-done; and we takes them out with a fork, and eats them. Sometimes we has a jug heaped up, pretty near my pinafore-full. I loves them dearly."

Surely this little bit of practical cottage economy is worth recording.

C. W. B.

* * * * *

Queries.

BIDDINGS IN WALES.

There is a nursery song beginning--

"Harry Parry, when will you marry? When apples and pears are ripe. I'll come to your wedding, without any bidding, And," &c. &c. &c.

Does this mean that I will come without an invitation, or without a marriage-present? It will be observed that Parry is a Welsh name, and that bidding is a Welsh custom, as is shown by MR. SPURRELL (Vol. iii., p. 114.). He has anticipated my intention of sending you a bidding-form, which has been lying upon my table for some weeks, but which I have not had time to transcribe; I now send it you, because it somewhat varies from MR. SPURRELL'S, and yet so much resembles it as to show that the same formula is preserved. Both show that the presents are considered as debts, transferable or assignable to other parties. Is this the case in all districts of Wales where the custom of bidding prevails? I think I have heard that in some places the gift is to be returned only when the actual donor "enters into the matrimonial state." It will be observed, too, in these forms, relations only transfer to relations. Is it considered that they may assign to persons not relations? Some of your Welsh correspondents may reply to these questions, which may elucidate all the varieties of practice in a custom which contributes much to the comfort of a young couple, and, in many instances, is an incentive to prudence, because they are aware that the debt is a debt of honour, not to be evaded without some loss of character.

"December 26. 1806.

"As we intend to enter the Matrimonial State on _Tuesday_ the 20th of _January_, 1807, we purpose to make a Bidding on the occasion the same day for the young man at his father's house, in the village of _Llansaint_, in the parish of _St. Ishmael_; and for the young {208} woman, at her own house, in the said village of _Llansaint_; at either of which places the favour of your good company on that day will be deemed a peculiar obligation; and whatever donation you may be pleased to confer on either of us then, will be gratefully received, and cheerfully repaid whenever required on a similar occasion, by

Your humble servants, SETH REES, ANN JENKINS.

"The young man's father and mother, and also the young woman's father and mother, and sister Amy, desire that all gifts of the above nature due to them, may be returned on the same day; and will be thankful for all favour shown the young couple."

E. H.

* * * * *

Minor Queries.

_Lord of Relton_ (Vol. iii., p. 56.)--Will your correspondent MONKBARNS favour me with the date of the paper from which he copied the paragraph quoted, and whether it was given as being then in use, or as of ancient date?

Can any of your readers inform me from what place the Lord of Relton derived his name? What was his proper name, and who is the present representative of the family?

Is there any family of the name of Relton now existing in the neighbourhood of Langholme, or in Cumberland or Westmoreland?

F. B. RELTON.

_Beatrix de Bradney._--In your "NOTES AND QUERIES" for January 25th, 1851, p. 61., you have given Sir Henry Chauncy's Observations on Wilfred Entwysel.

Sir Bertin left a daughter named Lucy, of whom Master Bradene of Northamptonshire is descended. Can F. R. R., or any genealogist, inform me whether this Master Bradene is descended from Simon de Bradney, one of the Knights of the Shire for Somersetshire in the year 1346? In Collins's _Somersetshire_, vol. iii. p. 92., he mentions:

"In St. Michael's Church, Bawdrip, under a large Gothic arch lies the effigy in armour of Sir Simon de Bradney or Bredenie.

"The Manor of Bradney, in Somersetshire, supposed to have ended in Beatrix de Bradney, an heiress, and passed with her into other families; this Beatrix was living in the forty-sixth year of Edward III."

Can you inform me whom she married? About sixty-five years ago it was purchased by the late Joseph Bradney, Esq., of Ham, near Richmond; and his second son, the Reverend Joseph Bradney, of Greet, near Tenbury, Shropshire, is the present possessor.

JULIA R. BOCKETT.

Southcote Lodge, near Reading.

"_Letters on the British Museum._"--In the year 1767 was published by Dodsley a work in 12mo. pp. 92., with the above title; and at p. 85. is printed "A Pastoral Dialogue," between _Celia_ and _Ebron_, beginning, "As Celia rested in the shade," which the author states he "found among the manuscripts." I wish to know, first, who was the anonymous author of these letters; and, secondly, in what collection of manuscripts this "Dialogue" is to be found.

[mu].

_Ballad Editing._--The "_Outlandish Knight_" (Vol. iii.,p. 49.).--I was exceedingly glad to see Mr. F. Sheldon's "valuable contribution to our stock of ballad literature" in the hands of Mr. Rimbault, and thought the treatment it received no better than it deserved. _Blackwood_, May, 1847, reviewed Mr. Sheldon's book, and pointed out several instances of his "godfathership;" among others, his ballad of the "Outlandish Knight," which he obtained from "a copy in the possession of a gentleman at Newcastle," was condemned by the reviewer as "a vamped version of the Scotch ballad of 'May Collean.'" It may be as the reviewer states, but the question I would wish answered is one affecting the reviewer himself; for, if I mistake not, the Southron "Outlandish Knight" is the original of "May Collean" itself. I have by me a copy, in black letter, of the "Outlandish Knight," English in every respect, and as such differing considerably from Mr. Sheldon's border edition, and from "May Collean;" and, with some slight alterations, the ballad I have is yet popularly known through the midland counties. If any of your correspondents can oblige me with a reference to the first appearance of "May Collean," sheet or book, I shall esteem it a favour.

EMUN.

Birmingham.

_Latin Epigram on the Duchess of Eboli._--In his controversy with Bowles touching the poetry of Pope, Byron states that it was upon the Princess of Eboli, mistress of Philip II. of Spain, and Mangirow, the minion of Henry III. of France, that the famous Latin epigram, so well known to classic readers, was composed, concluding with the couplet:

"Blande puer lumen quod habes concede parenti, Sic tu cæcus Amor, sic erit illa Venus."

Can any contributor to the "NOTES AND QUERIES" suggest what authority his lordship has for his statement? Many years since, a curious paragraph appeared in one of the public journals, extracted apparently from an historical work, specifying the extraordinary political embroglios which the one-eyed duchess occasioned, eliciting from one of the statesmen of her times the complimentary declaration, that if she had had two eyes instead of only one, she would have set the universe on fire. A reference to this work--I fancy one of Roscoe's--would be of material service to an historical inquirer.

C. R. H.

{209}

_Engraved Portrait._--

"All that thou see'st and readest is divine, Learning thus us'd is water turn'd to wine; Well may wee then despaire to draw his minde, View here the case; i'th Booke the Jewell finde."

The above quatrain is placed beneath a portrait characteristically engraved by Cross. Above the head is the following inscription:--

"Ætatis Suæ 50º. Octob. 10. 1649."

Of whom is this a portrait? It is no doubt well known to collectors, and is of course a frontispiece; but having never yet seen it _vis-à-vis_ with a title-page, I am at a loss as to the author of whom it is the _vera effigies_. Possibly some of your readers will be kind enough to enlighten me upon the matter, and favour me with the name of the British worthy thus handed down to posterity by Cross's admirable burin.

HENRY CAMPKIN.

_Blackstone's Commentaries and Table of Precedence._--The first edition of Blackstone was published at Oxford in 4to., in the year 1765; and the Table of Precedence, in the 12th chapter of the First Book, found in subsequent editions edited by Mr. Christian, does not occur in Blackstone's first edition. Can any of your readers, having access to good legal theories, inform me in which of Blackstone's _own_ editions the Table of Precedence was first inserted?

E.

_The Two Drs. Abercromby._--In the latter half of the seventeenth century, there were two physicians of the name of Abercromby, who both graduated at the university of Leyden, and were afterwards the authors of various published works. The first work of David Abercromby mentioned in Watt's _Bibliotheca_ is dated in 1684, and the first written by Patrick Abercromby in 1707. As it was usual to compose an inaugural dissertation at obtaining the doctorate, and such productions were ordinarily printed (in small quarto), J. K. would feel obliged by the titles and dates of the inaugural dissertations of either or both of the physicians above mentioned.

_Witte van Haemstede._--Can any of your readers inform me whether there still exist any descendants of _Witte van Haemstede_, an illegitimate scion of the ancient house of _Holland_? _Willem de Water_, in his _Adelijke Zeeland_, written in the seventeenth century, says that in his youth he knew a _Witte van Haemstede_ of this family, one of whose sons became pastor of the Dutch congregation in _London_.--_Navorscher_, Jan. 1851, p. 17.

_J. Bruckner--Dutch Church in Norwich._--In the _Gentleman's Magazine_ for 1804 is a short memoir of the Rev. J. Bruckner. He was born in the island of Cadsand, completed his studies at Leyden, where he enjoyed the society of Hemsterhuis, Valckenaer, and the elder Schultens. In 1753 he became pastor of the Walloon, and afterwards of the Dutch congregation in Norwich, where he remained till his death in May, 1804. In 1767 he published at Leyden his _Théorie du Système Animal_; in 1790 appeared his _Criticisms on the Diversions of Purley_.

Could your correspondents furnish me with a complete list of Bruckner's works, and direct me to a history of the Dutch church in Norwich, from its origin to the present time?--_Navorscher_, Feb. 1851, p. 28.

* * * * *

Minor Queries Answered.

[Under this heading we propose to give such Minor Queries as we are able to reply to at once, but which are not of a nature to be answered with advantage in our Notices to Correspondents. We hope by this means to economise our space.]

_The Hereditary Earl Marshal._--Miss Martineau, in her _History of England_, book iii. ch. 8., speaks (in 1829) of

"three Catholic peers, the _Duke of Norfolk_, Lord Clifford, and Lord Dormer, having obtained entrance _at last_ to the legislative assembly, where their fathers sat and ruled when their faith was the law of the land."

In Lord Campbell's _Lives of the Chancellors_, there is an anecdote, vol. vii. p. 695., of the Duke of Norfolk falling asleep and _snoring_ in the House of Lords, while Lord Eldon was on the woolsack. Did not the Duke of Norfolk (though Roman Catholic) sit and vote in the House of Lords, either by prescription or special act of parliament, before 1829?

J. H. S.

[The anecdote told by Lord Campbell (but much better by Lord Eldon himself in Twiss's Life of the great Chancellor), does not refer to the _late_ Duke of Norfolk, but to his predecessor Charles (the eleventh duke), who was a Protestant. The late duke never sat in parliament till after the Relief Bill passed. In 1824 a Bill was passed to enable him to exercise the office of Earl Marshal without taking certain oaths, but gave him no seat in the House. We may as well add, that Lord Eldon's joke must have been perpetrated--not on the bringing up of the Bill, when the duke was not in the House--but on the occasion of the _Great Snoring Bill being reported_ (April 2, 1811), when the duke appears to have been present.]

_The Beggar's Petition._--I shall feel obliged by your informing me who the author is of the lines--

"Pity the sorrows of a poor old man, Whose trembling limbs have borne him to your door."

S.

[The authorship of this little poem has at times excited a good deal of attention. It has been attributed, on no very sufficient grounds, to Dr. Joshua Webster, M.D.; but from the _Gentleman's Magazine_, vol. lxx., p. 41., it appears that it is the entire production of the {210} Rev. Thomas Moss, minister of Brierly Hill and Trentham, in Staffordshire, who wrote it at about the age of twenty-three. He sold the manuscript of that, and of several others, to Mr. Smart, printer, in Wolverhampton, who, from the dread which Mr. Moss had of criticism, was to publish them on this condition, that only twenty copies should have his name annexed to them, for the purpose of being presented to his relations and friends.]

"_Tiring-irons never to be untied._"--To what does Lightfoot (vol. vii. p. 214.) refer when, in speaking of the Scriptures, he says--

"They are not unriddleable riddles, and tiring-irons never to be untied"?

J. EASTWOOD.

Ecclesfield.

[The allusion is to a puzzle for children--often used by grown children--which consists of a series of iron rings, on to or off which a loop of iron wire may be got with some labour by those who know the way, and which is very correctly designated _a tiring-iron_.]

* * * * *

Replies.

THE MEANING OF EISELL.

[This controversy is becoming a little too warm for our pages. But MR. CAUSTON is entitled to have some portion of the letter he has sent to us inserted. He writes with reference to the communications from MR. HICKSON and MR. SINGER in our 68th number, p. 119., in reply to MR. C.'S Article, which, although it had been in our hands a considerable time, was not inserted until out 65th Number, p. 66.; a delay which gave to that article the appearance of an attempt to revive a discussion, whereas it really was written only in continuance of one.]