Notes and Queries, Number 79, May 3, 1851

"Videantur quæ ex Demosthene, Plutarcho, aliis, Eruditi annotarunt."

Matthew xiii. 14.:

"And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive."

This proverb seems to have been common to all ages and countries. It is of frequent occurrence in the New Testament (Mark iv. 12.; viii. 18.; John xii. 40.; Acts xxviii. 25.; Romans xi. 8.), and, as in Matthew, is referred to Isaiah. But, in the Old Testament, there is earlier authority for its use in Deuteronomy xxix. 4. It occurs also in Jeremiah v. 21.; in Ezekiel xii. 2., and, with a somewhat different application, in the Psalms, cxv. 5.; cxxxv. 16.

That it was employed as an established proverb by Demosthenes seems to have been generally overlooked. He says:

"Οἱ μὲν οὕτως ὁρῶντες τὰ τῶν ἠτυχηκότων ἔργα, ὥστε τὸτῆς παροιμίας, ὁρῶντες μὴ ὁρᾶν, καὶ ἀκούοντας μὴ ἀκούειν. (Κατὰ Ἀριστογείτονος, A Taylor, Cantab. vol. ii. pp. 494-5.)

It is quoted, however, by Pricæus (p. 97.), who also supplies exactly corresponding passages from Maximus Tyrius (A.D. 190), Plutarch (A.D. 107-20), and Philo (A.D. 41). Of these, the last only can have been prior to the publication of St. Matthew's Gospel, which Saxius places, at the earliest, in the reign of Claudius.

Hugo Grotius has no reference to Demosthenes in his Annotationes in Vet. Test., Vogel & Doderein, 1776; but cites Heraclitus the Ephesian, who, according to Saxius, flourished in the year 502 B.C., and Aristides, who, on the same authority, lived in the 126th year of the Christian era. Has any other commentator besides Pricæus alluded to the passage in Demosthenes?

C. H. P.

Brighton, April 21.

THE HOUSE OF MAILLÉ

The house of Maillé (vide Lord Mahon's Life of Condé) contributed to the Crusades one of its bravest champions. Can any of your numerous contributors give me information as to the name and achievements of the Crusader?

Claire Clémence de Maillé, daughter of the Maréchal Duke de Brezé, and niece of Richelieu, was married in 1641 to the Duc d'Enghien, afterwards the Great Condé; and Lord Mahon, somewhere in his life of the hero, makes mention of the princess as the "last of her family."

Claire Clémence had an only brother, who held the exalted post of High Admiral of France, and in 1646 he commanded a French fleet which disembarked 8000 men in the marshes of Sienna, and himself shortly afterwards fell at the siege of Orbitello. The admiral having died unmarried, the Brezé estates became the property of the princess, who transmitted them to her descendants, the last of whom was the unfortunate Duc d'Enghien, who perished at Vincennes.

Thus much is patent; but I think it probable his lordship was not aware that a branch of the family was exiled, and with the La Touches, La Bertouches, &c., settled in the sister kingdom, most likely at the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Their descendants subsequently passed over into this country, and have contributed to the lists of the legal and medical professions. Up to the present century a gentleman bearing the slightly altered name of Mallié held a commission in the British army. Even now, the family is not extinct, and the writer being lately on a visit to a lady, probably the sole representative in name of this once powerful house, noticed in her possession a series of four small engravings, representing the Great Condé; his mother, a princess of Montmorency, pronounced to be the "handsomest woman in Europe;" the old Maréchal de Maillé Brezé; and his daughter, Claire Clémence.

Our Pall Mall is, I believe, derived from Pailée Maillé, a game somewhat analogous to cricket, and imported from France in the reign of the second Charles: it was formerly played in St. James's Park, and in the exercise of the sport a small hammer or mallet was used to strike the ball. I think it worth noting that the Mallié crest is a mailed arm and hand, the latter grasping a mallet.

Be it understood that the writer has no pretensions to a knowledge of heraldic terms and devices; so, without pinning any argument on the coincidence, he thought it not without interest. He is aware that the mere fact of a similarity between surnames and crests is not without its parallel in English families.

A New Subscriber.

Birmingham, April 22. 1851.

Minor Queries

Meaning of "eign."—What is the meaning of the word "eign" in Presteign, also the name of a street and a brook? Is it connected with the Anglo-Saxon thegen or theign?

H. C. K.

Hereford.

The Bonny Cravat.—Can any of your readers give a probable explanation of the meaning of the sign of an inn at Woodchurch, in Kent, which is "The Bonny Cravat," now symbolised as a huge white neckcloth, with a "waterfall" tie?

E. H. Y.

What was the Day of the Accession of Richard III.?—Sir Harris Nicolas, in his Chronology of History (2nd edition, p. 326.) decides for June 26, 1433, giving strong reasons for such opinion. But his primary reason, founded on a fac-simile extract from the Memoranda Rolls in the office of the King's Remembrancer in the Exchequer of Ireland, printed, with fac-simile, in the second Report of the Commissioners on Irish Records, 1812, p. 160., gives rise to a doubt; for, as Sir Harris Colas states,

"It is remarkable that the printed copy should differ from the fac-simile in the identical point which caused the letter to be published, for in the former the 'xxvijth of June' occurs, whereas in the fac-simile it is the 'xxvjth of June.' The latter is doubtless correct; for an engraver, who copies precisely what is before him, is less likely to err than a transcriber or editor."

This is most probably the case; but perhaps some of your correspondents in Ireland will settle the point accurately.

J. E.

Lucas Family.—Can any of your correspondents inform me what were the names of the sons of John Lucas, of Weston, co. Suffolk, who lived at the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century? One of them, Thomas, was Solicitor-General, and a Privy Councillor, to Henry VII., and had estates in Suffolk.

W. L.

Watch of Richard Whiting.—In Warner's History of Glastonbury mention is made of the watch of Richard Whiting, the last abbot. It is stated in the Gentleman's Magazine of 1805 to have been in the possession of the Rev. Mr. Bowen, of Bath. Since then, I think, it was sold by auction; at least I have heard so. Perhaps some of your readers know what has become of it, and can say where it now is. The name "Richard Whiting" is said to be engraved inside it.

C. O. S. M.

Laurence Howel, the Original Pilgrim.—The unfortunate Laurence Howel published in 1717 (the year in which he was committed to Newgate) a little volume, entitled Desiderius; or, the Original Pilgrim, a Divine Dialogue, showing the most compendious Way to arrive at the Love of God. Rendered into English, and explained, with Notes. By Laurence Howel, A.M. London; printed by William Redmayne, for the Author, 1717. In the preface he tells us, that the work was originally written in Spanish; afterwards translated into Italian, French, High-Dutch and Low-Dutch, and about the year 1587 into Latin from the High-Dutch, by Laurentius Surius. There were subsequently two more Latin versions: one by Vander Meer, from the French and Dutch copies, compared with the original; and another by Antonius Boetzer in 1617. The author's name, he says, was unknown to all the editors, and the several editions had different titles; by some it was called the Treasure of Devotion, by others the Compendious Way to Salvation. The last, however (Boetzer's, I presume), bears that of Desiderius. As this was the author's title, Mr. Howel adopted it for his translation, adding, he says, that of the Original Pilgrim, to distinguish it from others of the same name, or very like it. He there informs us that Mr. Royston (the distinguished publisher in Charles II.'s and James II.'s reigns) had declared that Bishop Patrick took his Parable of the Pilgrim from it, and that it had formed the ground-work of the writings of many authors in that style.

Can any of your readers give me the titles of the editions in Spanish, or any language, of this interesting little book? I should be much obliged for any information regarding it. Is Howel's little translation scarce? Has the authorship of the original ever been hinted at?

Richard Hooper.

University Club, March 22. 1851.

The Churchwardens' Accounts, &c., of St. Mary-de-Castro, Leicester.—Nichols, in his History of Leicestershire, has given numerous extracts from the accounts of this ancient collegiate establishment (founded in 1107), and also from a book relating to the religious guild of The Trinity connected with the church. All these documents have now, however, entirely disappeared,—how, or at what period since the publication of the work, is unknown; but I find by a newspaper-cutting in my possession (unfortunately without date or auctioneer's name), that a very large collection of ancient documents, filling several boxes, and relating to this church and others in the county, was sold by auction in London some years ago, probably between the years 1825 and 1830. I shall feel obliged if any of your correspondents can inform me in whose possession they now are, and if they can be consulted.

Leicestrensis.

Aristotle and Pythagoras.—What reason (if any) is there for supposing that Aristotle derived his philosophy from Pythagoras himself?

D. K.

When Deans first styled Very Reverend.—Can any of your correspondents state at what period Deans of Cathedrals were first designated as "Very Reverend?" Forty years ago they prayed at Christ Church, Oxford, for the Reverend the Deans, the Canons, &c. The inscription on the stone covering the remains of Sir Richard Kaye, Bart., Dean of Lincoln, who died in 1809, terms him "the Reverend."

X. X.

Form of Prayer at the Healing (Vol. iii., pp. 42. 93. 148.).—As my note on this subject has been misunderstood, I would prefer this Query. What is the earliest edition of the Prayer Book in which the Form for the Healing appears? Mr. Lathbury states 1709, which is I believe the generally received date; but it is found in one printed in London in 1707 immediately before the Articles. Its appearance in the Prayer Book is entirely unauthorised; and it would be curious to ascertain also, whether it found a place in the Prayer Books printed at Oxford or Cambridge.

N. E. R. (a Subscriber).

West Chester.—In maps of Cheshire, 1670, and perhaps later, the city of Chester is thus called. Why is it so designated? It does not appear to be so called now. Passing through a village only six miles from London last week, I heard a mother saying to a child, "If you are not a good girl I will send you to West Chester." "Go to Bath" is common enough; but why should either of these places be singled out? The Cheshire threat seems to have been in use for some time, unless that city is still called West Chester.

John Francis X.

The Milesians.—With respect to the origin of the Milesian race little seems to be known, even by antiquaries who have given their attention to the archæology of Ireland, the inhabitants of which country are reputed to have been of Milesian origin. The Milesian race, also, is thought to have come over from Spain, a conjecture which is rather confirmed by the etymology of the names of some Irish towns, where the letters gh, as in Drogheda and Aghada, if so convertible, have the same pronunciation as the Spanish j in Aranjuez and Badajoz, and also by the expression and cast of features marked in many of the peasants of the south-west of Ireland, which strikingly resemble those of the children of Spain.

There is also another subject of antiquity in Ireland, and closely connected with her early history, of the true origin of which the world seems much in ignorance, viz. her Round Towers. Possibly some of your able correspondents will kindly supply some information on one or both of these subjects.

W. R. M.

Round Robbin.—In Dr. Heylin's controversy with Fuller on his Church History, the following quotation1 occurs:

"That the Sacrament of the Altar is nothing else but a piece of bread, or a little predie round robbin."

In the East Riding of Yorkshire the term is designative of a petition, in which all the names are signed radiating from a centre, so as to render it impossible to discover who was the first to sign it. What is the derivation of it?

R. W. E.

Cor. Chr. Coll., Cambridge.

Experto crede Roberto.—What is the origin of this saying?

N. B.

Captain Howe.—

Captain Howe, the King's (George II.) nephew by an illegitimate source."—Pictorial History of England, iv. 597.

Can you inform me how this captain was thus related to George II.?

F. B. Relton.

Bactria.—Can you refer me to a work worthy the name of The History of Bactria, or to detached information concerning Bactriana, under the Scythian kings? I also want a guide to the Græco-Bactrian series of coins.

Blowen.

Replies

THE FAMILY OF THE TRADESCANTS

(Vol. ii., pp. 119. 286.)

The family of the Tradescants is involved in considerable obscurity, and the period of the arrival of the first of that name in England is not, for a certainty, known. There were, it seems, three of the Tradescants at one time in this country—grandfather, father, and son. John Tradescant (or Tradeskin, as he was generally called by his contemporaries) the elder was, according to Anthony Wood, a Fleming or a Dutchman. He probably came to England about the latter end of the reign of Elizabeth, or in the beginning of that of James the First. He is reported to have been a great traveller, and to have previously visited Barbary, Greece, Egypt, and other Eastern countries. Upon his first arrival here he is said to have been successively gardener to the Lord Treasurer Salisbury, Lord Weston, the Duke of Buckingham, and other noblemen of distinction. In these situations he remained until the office of royal gardener was bestowed upon him in 1629.

To John Tradescant the elder, posterity is mainly indebted for the introduction of botany in this kingdom. "He, by great industry, made it manifest that there is scarcely any plant existing in the known world, that will not, with proper care, thrive in our climate." In a visit made by Sir W. Watson and Dr. Mitchell to Tradescant's garden in 1749, an account of which is inserted in the Philosophical Transactions, vol. xlvi. p. 160., it appears that it had been many years totally neglected, and the house belonging to it empty and ruined; but though the garden was quite covered with weeds, there remained among them manifest footsteps of its founder. They found there the Borago latifolia sempervivens of Caspar Bauhine; Polygonatum vulgare latifolium, C.B.; Aristolochia clematitis recta, C.B.; and the Dracontium of Dodoens. There were then remaining two trees of the Arbutus, which from their being so long used to our winters, did not suffer from the severe cold of 1739-40, when most of their kind were killed in England. In the orchard there was a tree of the Rhamnus catharticus, about twenty feet high, and nearly a foot in diameter. There are at present no traces of this garden remaining.

In the Ashmolean Library is preserved (No. 1461.) a folio manuscript (probably in the handwriting of the elder Tradescant) which purports to be "The Tradescants' Orchard, illustrated in sixty-five coloured drawings of fruits, exhibiting various kinds of the apple, cherry, damson, date, gooseberry, peares, peaches, plums, nectarines, grape, Hasell-nutt, quince, strawberry, with the times of their ripening."

Old John Tradescant died in the year 1652, at which period he was probably far advanced in years, leaving behind him a son (also of the same name) who seems to have inherited his father's talents and enthusiasm. There is a tradition that John Tradescant the younger entered himself on board a privateer going against the Algerines, that he might have an opportunity of bringing apricot-trees from that country. He is known to have taken a voyage to Virginia, whence he returned with many new plants. The two Tradescants were the means of introducing a variety of curious species into this kingdom, several of which bore their name. Tradescants' Spiderwort and Aster are well known to this day, and Linnæus has immortalised them among the botanists by making a new genus under their names of the Spiderwort, which had been before called Ephemeron.

When the elder Tradescant first settled in England, he formed a curious collection of natural history, coins, medals, and a great variety of "uncommon rarities." A catalogue of them was published in 12mo. in the year 1656, by his son, under the name of Museum Tradescantianum; to which are prefixed portraits, both of the father and son, by Hollar. This Museum or "Ark," as it was termed, was frequently visited by persons of rank, who became benefactors thereto; among these were Charles the First, Henrietta Maria (his queen), Archbishop Laud, George Duke of Buckingham, Robert and William Cecil, Earls of Salisbury, and many other persons of distinction: among them also appears the philosophic John Evelyn, who in his Diary has the following notice:

"Sept. 17, 1657, I went to see Sir Robert Needham, at Lambeth, a relation of mine, and thence to John Tradescant's museum."

"Thus John Tradeskin starves our wondering eyesBy boxing up his new-found rarities."

Ashmole, in his Diary (first published by Charles Burman in 1717), has three significant entries relating to the subject of our notice, which I transcribe verbatim:

"Decem. 12, 1659. Mr. Tredescant and his wife told me they had been long considering upon whom to bestow their closet of curiosities when they died, and at last had resolved to give it unto me.

"April 22, 1662. Mr. John Tredescant died.

"May 30, 1662. This Easter term I preferred a bill in Chancery against Mrs. Tredescant, for the rarities her husband had settled on me."

The success of Ashmole's suit is well known; but the whole transaction reflects anything but honour upon his name. The loss of her husband's treasures probably preyed upon the mind of Mrs. Tradescant; for in the Diary before quoted, under April 4, 1678, Ashmole says:

"My wife told me that Mrs. Tradescant was found drowned in her pond. She was drowned the day before at noon, as appears by some circumstance."

This was the same Hesther Tradescant who erected the Tradescant monument in Lambeth churchyard. She was buried in the vault where her husband and his son John (who "died in his spring") had been formerly laid.

The table monument to the memory of the Tradescants was erected in 1662. The sculptures on the four sides are as follows, viz. on the north, a crocodile, shells, &c., and a view of some Egyptian buildings; on the south, broken columns, Corinthian capitals, &c., supposed to be ruins in Greece, or some Eastern country; on the east, Tradescant's arms, on a bend three fleurs-de-lys, impaling a lion passant; on the west, a hydra, and under it a skull; various figures of trees, &c., in relievo, adorn the four corners of the tomb; over it is placed a handsome tablet of black marble. The monument, by the contribution of some friends to their memory, was in the year 1773 repaired, and (according to Sir John Hawkins) the following lines, "formerly intended for an epitaph, inserted thereon." Other authorities say that they were merely restored.

"Know, stranger, ere thou pass beneath this stone,Lye John Tradescant, grandsire, father, son;The last dy'd in his spring; the other twoLiv'd till they had travell'd Art and Nature through,As by their choice collections may appear,Of what is rare, in land, in sea, in air;Whilst they (as Homer's Iliad in a nut)A world of wonders in one closet shut;These famous antiquarians that had beenBoth Gardeners to the Rose and Lily Queen,Transplanted now themselves, sleep here; and whenAngels shall with their trumpets waken men,And fire shall purge the world, these hence shall rise,And change this garden for a Paradise."

A number of important errors concerning this once celebrated family have been made by different writers. Sir John Hawkins, in a note to his edition of Walton's Angler (edit. 1792, p. 24.), says:

"There were, it seems, three of the Tradescants, grandfather, father, and son: the son is the person here meant: the two former were gardeners to Queen Elizabeth, and the latter to King Charles I."

The epitaph above quoted satisfactorily proves, I think, that the Tradescants were never gardeners to the maiden Queen. "The rose and lily queen" was certainly Henrietta Maria, the queen of Charles the First. I have now before me (from the cabinet of a friend) a small silver medal struck to commemorate the marriage of Charles the First. It has on the obverse the busts of Charles and Henrietta, the sun shining from the clouds above them: the inscription is CH: MAG: ET: HEN: MA: BRIT: REX: ET: REG. The reverse contains in the field, Cupid mixing lilies with roses; the legend being FVNDIT: AMOR: LILIA: MIXTA: ROSIS. In the exergue is the date 1625. The Tradescant mentioned by Walton in 1653 was the second of that name, not the son, as stated by Sir John Hawkins.

The editor of the last edition of Evelyn's Diary (vol. ii. p. 414.) says, speaking of the Tradescants:

"They were all eminent gardeners, travellers, and collectors of curiosities. The two first came into this country in the reign of James I., and the second and third were employed in the Royal Gardens by Charles I."

Here is a positive statement that the elder Tradescant and his son came into England in the reign of James I. But there is no proof of this given. It is merely the writer's assertion. At the end of the same note, speaking of Tradescant's Ark, the editor observes:

"It formed the foundation of the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, and a catalogue of its contents was printed by the youngest John Tradescant in 1656, with the title of Museum Tradescantianum. He died in 1652."

It was not the youngest John Tradescant that died in 1652, but the oldest, the grandfather—the first of that name that settled in England.

The following is a list of the portraits of the Tradescant family now in the Ashmolean Museum; both father and son are in these portraits called Sir John, though it does not appear that either of them was ever knighted. Mr. Black, in his excellent catalogue of the Ashmolean Library, also calls the elder Tradescant Sir John. (See p. 1266.)

1. Sir John Tradescant, sen., three-quarter size, ornamented with fruit, flowers, and garden roots.

2. The same, after his decease.

3. The same, a small three-quarter piece, in water colours.

4. A large painting of his wife, son, and daughter, quarter-length.

5. Sir John Tradescant, junior, in his garden, with a spade in his hand, half-length.

6. The same with his wife, half-length.

7. The same, with his friend Zythepsa of Lambeth, a collection of shells, &c. upon a table before them.

8. A large quarter piece inscribed Sir John Tradescant's second wife and son.

Granger says he saw a picture at a gentleman's house in Wiltshire, which was not unlike that of the deceased Tradescant, and the inscription was applicable to it:

"Mortuus haud alio quam quo pater ore quiesti,Quam facili frueris nunc quoque nocte doces."

I may add, in conclusion, that several beautiful drawings of the Tradescant monument in Lambeth churchyard are preserved in the Pepysian library. These drawings were engraved for the Philosophical Transactions, vol. lxiii. p. 88.; and are printed from the same plates in the Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, vol. ii.

Edward F. Rimbault.

MEANING OF VENVILLE

(Vol. iii., pp. 152. 310.)

I observe, in p. 310. of the present volume, that two correspondents, P. and K., have contributed conjectures as to the meaning and origin of the term venville, noticed and explained antè, p. 152. The origin of the word is of course to some extent open to conjecture; but they may rest assured that the meaning of it is not, nor ever has been, within the domain of mere conjecture with those who have had any opportunities of inquiry in the proper quarter. The term has not the slightest reference to the ceremony of delivering possession, which P. has evidently witnessed in the case of his father, and which lawyers call livery of seisin; nor is there on Dartmoor any such word as ven signifying peat, or as fail, signifying turf. No doubt a fen on the moor would probably contain "black earth or peat," like most other mountain bogs; and if (as K. says) fail means a "turf or flat clod" in Scotland, I think it probable that a Scotchman on Dartmoor might now and then so far forget himself as to call peat or turf by a name which would certainly not be understood by an aboriginal Devonian. The local name of the peat or other turf cut for fuel is vaggs, and this has perhaps been confounded in the recollection of K.'s informant with ven. At all events, I can assure both P. and K. (who, I presume, are not familiar with the district) that the tenants of venville lands have no functions to perform, as such, in any degree connected with either turf-cutting, or "fenging fields," and that they do not necessarily, or generally, occupy peat districts, or rejoice in