Notes and Queries, Number 187, May 28, 1853

"Winchester. No, surely, I am fully determined, and fully at a point therein, howsoever my brethren do."—Id., p. 691.

"Brad. Sir, so that you will define me your church, that under it you bring not in a false church, you shall not see but that we shall soon be at a point."—Id., vol. vii. p. 190.

"Latimer. Truly, my lord, as for my part I require no respite, for I am at a point. You shall give me respite in vain; therefore, I pray you let me not trouble you to-morrow."—Id., p. 534.

"Unto whom he (Lord Cobham) gave this answer: 'Do as ye shall think best, for I am at a point.' Whatsoever he (Archbishop Arundel) or the other bishops did ask him after that, he bade them resort to his bill: for thereby would he stand to the very death."—Id., vol. iii. pp. 327-8.

"'Et illa et ista vera esse credantur et nulla inter nos contentio remanebit, quia nec illis veris ista, nec istis veris illa impediuntur.' Let bothe those truthes and these truthes be beleued, and we shall be at appoinct. For neither these truthes are impaired by the other, neither the other by these."—A Fortresse of the Faith, p. 50., by Thomas Stapleton: Antwerp, 1565.

"A poore man that shall haue liued at home in the countrie, and neuer tasted of honoure and pompe, is alwayes at a poynt with himselfe, when menne scorne and disdayne him, or shewe any token of contempt towardes his person."—John Calvin's CVIII. Sermon on the Thirtieth Chap. of Job, p. 554., translated by Golding: London, 1574.

"As for peace, I am at a point."—Leycester Correspondence, Camd. Soc., p. 261.

W. R. Arrowsmith.(To be continued.)

FOLK LORE

Weather Rules.—The interesting article on "The Shepherd of Banbury's Weather Rules" (Vol. vii., p. 373.) has reminded me of two sayings I heard in Worcestershire a few months back, and upon which my informant placed the greatest reliance. The first is, "If the moon changes on a Sunday, there will be a flood before the month is out." My authority asserted that through a number of years he has never known this fail. The month in which the change on a Sunday has occurred has been fine until the last day, when the flood came. The other saying is, "Look at the weathercock on St. Thomas's day at twelve o'clock, and see which way the wind is, and there it will stick for the next quarter," that is, three months. Can any of your readers confirm the above, and add any similar "weather rules?"

J. A., Jun.

Birmingham.

Drills presaging Death (Vol. vii., p. 353.).—Your correspondent asks if the superstition he here alludes to in Norfolk is believed in other parts. I can give him a case in point in Berkshire:—Some twenty years ago an old gentleman died there, a near relative of my own; and on going down to his place, I was told by a farm overseer of his, that he was certain some of his lordship's family would die that season, as, in the last sowing, he had missed putting the seed in one row, which he showed me! "Who could disbelieve it now?" quoth the old man. I was then taken to the bee-hives, and at the door of every one this man knocked with his knuckles, and informed the occupants that they must now work for a new master, as their old one was gone to heaven. This, I believe, has been queried in your invaluable paper some time since. I only send it by the way. I know the same superstition is still extant in Cheshire, North Wales, and in some parts of Scotland.

T. W. N.

Malta.

A friend supplies me with the information that before drills were invented, the labourers considered it unlucky to miss a "bout" in corn or seed sowing, will sometimes happened when "broadcast" was the only method. The ill-luck did not relate alone to a death in the family of the farmer or his dependents, but to losses of cattle or accidents. It is singular, however, that the superstition should have transferred itself to the drill; but it will be satisfactory to E. G. R. to learn that the process of tradition and superstition-manufacturing is not going on in the nineteenth century.

E. S. Taylor.

Superstition in Devonshire; Valentine's Day (Vol. v., pp. 55. 148.).—This, according to Forby, vol. ii. p. 403., once formed in Norfolk a part of the superstitious practices on St. Mark's Eve, not St. Valentine's, as mentioned by J. S. A., when the sheeted ghosts of those who should die that year (Mrs. Crowe would call them, I suppose, Doppelgängers) march in grisly array to the parish church.

The rhyme varies from J. S. A.'s:—

"Hempseed I sow:Hempseed grow;He that is my true loveCome after me, and mow."

and the Norfolk spectre is seen with a scythe, instead of a rake like his Devonshire compeer.

E. S. Taylor.

A NOTE ON GULLIVER'S TRAVELS

If I may argue from the silence of the latest edition of Gulliver's Travels, with Notes, with which I am acquainted, viz. that by W. C. Taylor, LL.D., Trinity College, Dublin, the Preface to which is dated May 1st, 1840, I may say that all the commentators on Swift—all, at least, down to that late date—have omitted to refer to a work containing incidents closely resembling some of those recorded in the "Voyage to Lilliput."

The work to which I allude is a little dramatical composition, the Bambocciata, or puppet-show, by Martelli, entitled The Sneezing of Hercules. Goldoni, in his Memoirs, has given us the following account of the manner in which he brought it out on the stage:

"Count Lantieri was very well satisfied with my father, for he was greatly recovered, and almost completely cured: his kindness was also extended to me, and to procure amusement for me he caused a puppet-show, which was almost abandoned, and which was very rich in figures and decorations, to be refitted.

"I profited by this, and amused the company by giving them a piece of a great man, expressly composed for wooden comedians. This was the Sneezing of Hercules, by Peter James Martelli, a Bolognese.

      ·       ·       ·       ·       ·       ·       ·       ·       ·       ·

"The imagination of the author sent Hercules into the country of the pigmies. Those poor little creatures, frightened at the aspect of an animated mountain with legs and arms, ran and concealed themselves in holes. One day as Hercules had stretched himself out in the open field, and was sleeping tranquilly, the timid inhabitants issued out of their retreats, and, armed with prickles and rushes, mounted on the monstrous man, and covered him from head to foot, like flies when they fall on a piece of rotten meat. Hercules waked, and felt something in his nose, which made him sneeze; on which, his enemies tumbled down in all directions. This ends the piece.

"There is a plan, a progression, an intrigue, a catastrophe, and winding up; the style is good and well-supported; the thoughts and sentiments are all proportionate to the size of the personages. The verses even are short, and everything indicates pigmies.

"A gigantic puppet was requisite for Hercules; everything was well executed. The entertainment was productive of much pleasure; and I could lay a bet, that I am the only person who ever thought of executing the Bambocciata of Martelli."—Memoirs of Goldoni, translated by John Black, 2 vols., duod. vol. i. chap. 6.

It is certainly not necessary to point out here in what respects the adventures of Hercules, the animated mountain, and those of Quinbus Flestrin, the man mountain, differ from, or coincide with, each other, as the only question I wish to raise is, whether a careful analysis of Martelli's puppet-show ought, or ought not, to have been placed among the notes on Gulliver's Travels.

C. Forbes.

Temple.

SHAKSPEARE CORRESPONDENCE

In reply to J. M. G. of Worcester, who inquires for a MS. volume of English poetry containing some lines attributed to Shakspeare, and which is described in Thorpe's Catalog of MSS. for 1831, I can supply some particulars which may assist him in the research. The MS., which at one period had belonged to Joseph Hazlewood, was purchased from Thorpe by the late Lord Viscount Kingsborough; after whose decease it was sold, in November, 1842, at Charles Sharpe's literary sale room, Anglesea Street, Dublin. It is No. 574. in the auction catalogue of that part of his lordship's library which was then brought to auction.

The volume has been noticed by Patrick Fraser Tytler, in his Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, Edinburgh, 1833 (in Appendix B, p. 436., of 2nd edit.), where, citing the passage from Collier, which is referred to by J. M. G., he asserts that the lines are not Shakspeare's, but Jonson's. But he does not appear to me to have established his case beyond doubt; as the lines, though found among Jonson's works, may, notwithstanding, be the production of some other writer: and why not of Shakspeare, to whom they are ascribed in the MS.? Some verses by Sir J. C. Hobhouse originally appeared as Lord Byron's: and there are numerous instances, both ancient and modern, of a similar attribution of works to other than their actual authors.

Arterus.

Dublin.

The Island of Prospero.—We cannot assert that Shakspeare, in the Tempest, had any particular island in view as the scene of his immortal drama, though by some this has been stoutly maintained. Chalmers prefers one of the Bermudas. The Rev. J. Hunter, in his Disquisition on the Scene, &c. of the Tempest, endeavours to confer the honour on the Island of Lampedosa. In reference to this question, a statement of the pseudo-Aristotle is remarkable. In his work "περὶ θαυμασίων ἀκουσμάτων," he mentions Lipara, one of the Æolian Islands, lying to the north of Sicily, and nearly in the course of Shakspeare's Neapolitan fleet from Tunis to Naples. Among the πολλὰ τερατώδη found there, he tells us:

"Ἐξακούεσθαι γὰρ τυμπάνων καὶ κυμβάλων ἦχον γέλωτα τε μετὰ θορύβου καὶ κροτάλων ἐναργῶς. λέγουσι δέ τι τερατωδέστερον γεγονέναι περὶ τὸ σπήλαιον."

If we compare this with the aerial music heard by Ferdinand (Tempest, I. 2.), especially as the orchestra is represented by the genial burin of M. Retsch in the fifth plate of his well-known sketches (Umrisze), it will appear probable that Shakspeare was acquainted with the Greek writer either in the original or through a translation. As far as I am aware, this has not been observed by any of the commentators.—From The Navorscher.

J. M.

Coincident Criticisms.—I shall be obliged if you will allow me through your pages to anticipate and rebut two charges of plagiarism. When I wrote my Note on a passage in The Winter's Tale ("N. & Q.," Vol. vii., p. 378.), I had not seen the Dublin University Magazine for March last, containing some remarks on the same passage in some respects much resembling mine. I must also declare that my Note on a passage in All's Well that ends Well ("N. & Q.," Vol. vii., p. 426.) was posted for you some time before the appearance of A. E. B.'s Note on the same passage ("N. & Q.," Vol. vii., p. 403.). The latter coincidence is more remarkable than the former, as the integrity of the amended text was in both notes discussed by means of the same parallel passage. Apropos of A. E. B.'s clever Note, permit me to say, that though at first it appeared to me conclusive, I now incline to think that Shakspeare intended Helen to address the leaden messengers by means of a very hyperbolic figure: "wound the still-piecing air that sings with piercing" is a consistent whole. If, as A. E. B. rightly says, to wound the air is an impossibility, it is equally impossible that the air should utter any sound expressive of sensibility. The fact of course is, that the cannon-balls cleave the air, and that by so cleaving it a shrill noise is produced. The cause and effect may, however, be metaphorically described, by comparing air to Bertram. I believe it is a known fact that every man who is struck with a cannon-ball cries out instinctively. Shakspeare therefore might, I think, have very poetically described the action and effect of a cannon-ball passing through the air by the strong figure of wounding the air that sings with the piercing which it is enduring.

In concluding this Note, I beg to express what is not merely my own, but a very general feeling of disappointment in respect of Mr. Collier's new edition of Shakspeare. To it, with a new force, may be applied the words of A. E. B. in "N. & Q.," Vol. vi., p. 296.:

"But the evil of these emendations is not in this instance confined to the mere suggestion of doubt; the text has absolutely been altered in all accessible editions, in many cases silently, so that the ordinary reader has no opportunity of judging between Shakspeare and his improvers."

That Mr. Collier should be the greatest of such offenders, is no very cheering sign of the times.

C. Mansfield Ingleby.

Birmingham.

Dogberry's Losses (Vol. vii., p. 377.).—I do not know whether it has ever been suggested, but I feel inclined to read "lawsuits." He has just boasted of himself as "one that knows the law;" and it seems natural enough that he should go on to brag of being a rich fellow enough, "and a fellow that hath had lawsuits" of his own, and actually figured as plaintiff or defendant. Suppose the words taken down from the mouth of an actor, and the mistake would be easy.

John Doe.

THE CŒNACULUM OF LIONARDO DA VINCI

I have in my possession a manuscript critique on the celebrated picture of The Last Supper by Lionardo da Vinci, written many years ago by a deceased academician; in which the writer has called in question the point of time usually supposed to have been selected by the celebrated Italian painter. The criticisms are chiefly founded on the copy by Marco Oggioni, now in the possession of the Royal Academy of Arts.

Uniform tradition has assumed that the moment of action is that in which the Saviour announces the treachery of one of his disciples "Dico vobis quia unus vestrum me traditurus est." Matth. xxvi. 21., Joan. xiii. 21., Vulgate edit.; and most of the admirers of this great work have not failed to find in it decisive proofs of the intention of the painter to represent that exact point of time.

The author of the manuscript enters into a very detailed examination of the several groups of figures which compose the picture, and of the expression of the heads; and he confesses his inability to find in them anything decisively indicating the period supposed to be chosen. He remarks that nine at least of the persons, including the principal one, are evidently engaged in animated conversation; that instead of that concentrated attention which the announcement might be supposed to generate, there appears to be great variety of expressions and of action; and that neither surprise nor indignation are so generally prominent, as might have been expected. He inclines to think that the studied diversity of expression, and the varied attitudes and gestures of the assembled party, are to be regarded as proofs of the artist's efforts to produce a powerful and harmonious composition, rather than a natural and truthful representation of any particular moment of the transaction depicted by him.

The work in question is now so generally accessible through the medium of accurate engravings, that any one may easily exercise his own judgment on the matter, and decide for himself whether the criticism be well founded.

It must be borne in mind that the subject had long been a familiar decoration of conventual refectories before the time when Lionardo brought his profound knowledge of external human nature, and his unsurpassed powers of executive art, to bear on a subject which had before been treated in the dry, conventional, inanimate manner of the Middle Ages. The leading features of the traditional picture are retained: the long table, the linen cloth, the one-sided arrangement of the figures, the classic drapery, and the general form and design of the apartment, are all to be found in the earlier works; and must have been considered, by observers in general, far more essential to the correct delineation of the scene than any adherence to the exact description of it in any one of the Evangelists. But as the subject was usually introduced into refectories for the edification of the brethren assembled with their superior at their own meals, it does not seem likely that the treachery of Judas should have been intended to be the prominent action of the picture. It was a memorial of the institution of the Eucharist, although the Christ was not represented as dispensing either bread or wine. In such a case, if any particular point of time was ever contemplated by the artist, he might judiciously and appropriately select the moment when the Saviour was announcing, in mysterious words, the close of his mission—as in St. Matthew and St. Mark; or was teaching them a lesson of humility when the spirit of rivalry and strife had disclosed itself among them—as we find in St. Luke and St. John.

It is not perhaps generally known that the statutes of Queen's College, Oxford, prescribe the order of sitting at the common table in manner which evidently refers to the cœnaculum of the old church painters.

E. Smirke.

Minor Notes

Scotter Register (County Lincoln).—The following extracts from the register of the parish of Scotter, in the county of Lincoln, are perhaps sufficiently interesting to be worth printing in "N. & Q.":

1. "Eccelesia parochialis de Scotter comitatu Lincolniæ dedicata est Beatis Apostolis Sancto Petro et Sancto Paulo ut apparet in Antiquo Scripto viduæ Loddington de Scotter, viz. in testamento vltimo Thomæ Dalyson, Gen. de Scotter, qui obiit Junii 19o, anno Domini 1495.

"Gul. Carrington,"Rector eclīa ibid."

2. "Memorandum, That on Septuagesima Sunday, being the 19th day of January, 1667, one Francis Drury, an excommunicate person, came into the church in time of divine service in ye morning, and being admonisht by mee to begon, hee obstinately refused, whereuppon ye whole congregation departed; and after the same manner in the afternoon, the same day, he came again, and refusing againe to go out, the whole congregation againe went home, soe yt little or no service pformed. They prevented his further coming in yt manner, as hee threatned, by order from the Justice, uppon the statute of Queene Elizabeth concerning the molestation and disturbance of publiq preachers.

Wm. Carrington, Rec."

"O tempora, O mores."

3. "Michæl Skinner Senex centum et trium annorum sepultus fuit die sancti Johannis, viz. Dec. 27, 1673."

Edward Peacock, Jun.

Bottesford Moors, Kirton Lindsey.

"All my Eye."—"Over the Left."

"What benefit a Popish successor can reap from lives and fortunes spent in defence of the Protestant religion, he may put in his eye: and what the Protestant religion gets by lives and fortunes spent in the service of a Popish successor, will be over the left shoulder."—Preface to Julian the Apostate: London, printed for Langley Curtis, on Ludgate Hill. 1682.

Is this passage the origin of the above cant phrases?

George Daniel.

Canonbury.

Curious Marriages.—In Harl. MSS. 1550, p. 180., is the pedigree of Irby, where Anthony Irby has two daughters: Margaret, who married Henry Death, and Dorothy, who married John Domesday.

E. G. Ballard.

Child-mother.—Four months ago, on board the Brazil packet, the royal mail steam-vessel Severn, there was an instance of a "child-wife," which might be worthy of a place among your curiosities of that description.

She was the wedded wife of a Brazilian travelling from the Brazils to Lisbon, and her husband applied for permission to pay the "reduced passage money" for her as being "under twelve years of age!"

As the regulation on that head speaks of "children under twelve years of age," this conscientious Brazilian's demand could not be countenanced.

His wife's age was under eleven years and a half, and (credat Judæus) she was a mother!

A. L.

Queries

FURTHER QUERIES RESPECTING BISHOP KEN

(Continued from Vol. vii., p. 380.)

In a Collection of Poems, in six volumes, by several Hands (Dodsley, 5th edition, 1758), and in vol. iii. p. 75., is found "An Epistle from Florence to T. A., Esq., Tutor to the Earl of P–. Written in the year 1740. By the Honourable –." Can any one explain an allusion contained in these three lines of the epistle?

"Or with wise Ken judiciously define,When Pius marks the honorary coinOf Caracalla, or of Antonine."

It is hardly to be supposed that the Ken here named could mean the bishop, who died so far back as 1711. Was there a coin-collector of that name living about 1740?

We learn (from Ken's Prose Works, ed. Round, pp. 93, 94.) that the Bishop's sister, "my poor sister Ken," most probably then a widow, lost her only son, who died at Cyprus, in 1707. Was this Mrs. Ken the Rose Vernon, sister of Sir Thomas Vernon, of Coleman Street, London, and the wife of Jon Ken, the bishop's eldest brother, and treasurer of the East India Company? This Jon and Rose Ken are represented, in Mr. Markland's Pedigree of the Ken family, as still living in 1683. Is there no monumental memorial of this Treasurer Ken, or his family, in any of the London churches?

In Mr. Macaulay's History of England, 5th ed., vol. ii. p. 365., he states that "it was well known that one of the most opulent dissenters of the City had begged that he might have the honour of giving security for Ken," when the seven bishops were bailed, previous to their trial. On what authority (for none is cited) does this statement rest?

Can any one give a clue to this passage from a letter written to Mr. Harbin, Lord Weymouth's chaplain, by Bishop Ken, and dated "Winton, Jan 22." [1701]:

"I came to Winchester yesterday, where I stay one post more, and then go either to Sir R. U. or L. Newton, where you shall hear from me."—Ken's Prose Works, by Round, p. 53.

Can "Sir R. U." (the U perhaps being a mistake for W.) designate Sir Robert Worsley, Bart., of Chilton, in the county of Southampton, married to Lord Weymouth's daughter? and can "L. Newton" be a mistake for Long Sutton, in Hants? or may it be Long Newton, in the hundred of Malmesbury?

J. J. J.

Temple.

THE REV. JOHN LAWSON AND HIS MATHEMATICAL MANUSCRIPTS

In the year 1774 the Rev. John Lawson, B.D., Rector of Swanscombe in Kent, published A Dissertation on the Geometrical Analysis of the Antients, with a Collection of Theorems and Problems without solutions for the Exercise of young Students. This work was printed anonymously at Canterbury, but the merits of the essay did not permit the author to remain long in obscurity; the real writer was immediately known to most of the geometers of the day, and the elegant character of many of the theorems and problems, led to a general desire that their solutions should be published in a separate work. In accordance with this intention, it was announced on a fly-sheet attached to some copies of the work, that—

"The author of this publication being a man of leisure, and living in a retired situation, remote from any opportunity of conversation with mathematicians, would be extremely glad of a correspondence with any such, who are willing to be at the expense of the same; or if this be thought too much, will pay the postage of his answers to their letters. But no letters, except post-paid, can be received by him; otherwise a door would be opened for frolic, imposition, and impertinence. Any new geometrical propositions, either theorems or problems, would be received with gratitude, and if sent without solutions, he would use his best endeavours to return such as might be satisfactory. Any new solutions of propositions already in print, especially of those included in the present collection, would also be very agreeable. If a variety of such demonstrations essentially different from those of the original authors should be communicated, he proposes at some future time to publish them all, with a fresh collection for further exercise; and then each author's name shall be affixt to his own solution, or any other signature which he shall please to direct. Any person who shall favor the publisher with his correspondence shall have speedily conveyed to him the solutions of any propositions contained in this collection, which he may be desirous of seeing. Letters (post-paid) directed for P. Q., to be left at Mr. Nourse's, Bookseller, in the Strand, London, will be carefully transmitted on the first day of each month, and all correspondents may expect answers during the course of that month."