Chapter I: Front Matter

NOTES AND QUERIES:

A MEDIUM OF INTER-COMMUNICATION FOR LITERARY MEN, ARTISTS, ANTIQUARIES, GENEALOGISTS, ETC.

* * * * *

"When found, make a note of."--CAPTAIN CUTTLE.

* * * * *

No. 9.] SATURDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1849 [Price Threepence. Stamped Edition 4d.

* * * * * {129}

CONTENTS

Our Progress

NOTES:--
Sir E. Dering's Household Book, by Rev. Lambert B. Larking. 130
Berkeley's Theory of Vision, by Rev. J.H. Todd. 131
Bishop Barnaby. 131
Mathematical Archæology. 132
Song in Style of Suckling, &c. 133
Gothic Architecture. 134
Dr. Burney's Musical Works, by E.F. Rimbault. 135
Ancient Alms' Basins, by Dr. Bell. 135
Minor Notes:--Prince Madoc--St. Barnabas--Register
of Cromwell's Baptism--The Times--Rowland
Monoux--Wassail Song--Portrait of Charles I.--Autograph
Mottoes of Richard Duke of Gloucester
and Henry Duke of Buckingham. 136
Notes in answer to Queries:--Lord Erksine's Brooms--Scarborough
Warning--Gray's Elegy--Coffee, the Lacedæmonian Black Broth. 138

QUERIES:--
The Last of the Villains, by E. Smirke. 139
The Dore of Holy Scripture. 139
Turner's MS. History of Westminster. 140
Talisman of Charlemagne. 140
Dick Shore, Isle of Dogs, &c. 141
Minor Queries:--The Strand Maypole--To Fettle--Greek
Verse--Dr. Dee's Petition--Vondel's Lucifer--Discurs
Modest--Ptolemy of Alexandria--Vanbrugh's
London Improvements--Becket's Grace-Cup--Sir
Herbert's Office-Book. 142

MISCELLANEOUS:--
Books and Odd Volumes wanted. 143
Notices to Correspondents. 143
Advertisements. 144

* * * * *

OUR PROGRESS

We have this week been called upon to take a step which neither our best friends nor our own hopes could have anticipated. Having failed in our endeavours to supply by other means the increasing demand for complete sets of our "NOTES AND QUERIES," we have been compelled to reprint the first four numbers.

It is with no slight feelings of pride and satisfaction that we record the fact of a large impression of a work like the present not having been sufficient to meet the demand,--a work devoted not to the witcheries of poetry or to the charms of romance, but to the illustration of matters of graver import, such as obscure points of national history, doubtful questions of literature and bibliography, the discussion of questionable etymologies, and the elucidation of old world customs and observances.

What Mr. Kemble lately said so well with reference to archæology, our experience justifies us in applying to other literary inquiries:--

"On every side there is evidence of a generous and earnest
co-operation among those who have devoted themselves to special
pursuits; and not only does this tend of itself to widen the
general basis, but it supplies the individual thinker with an
ever widening foundation for his own special study."

And whence arises this "earnest co-operation?" Is it too much to hope that it springs from an increased reverence for the Truth, from an intenser craving after a knowledge of it--whether such Truth regards an event on which a throne depended, or the etymology of some household word now familiar only to

"Hard-handed men who work in Athens here?"

We feel that the kind and earnest men who honour our "NOTES AND QUERIES" with their correspondence, hold with Bacon, that

"Truth, which only doth judge itself, teacheth that the inquiry
of Truth, which is the love-making or wooing of it--the
knowledge of Truth, which is the presence of it--and the belief
of Truth, which is the enjoying of it--is the sovereign good of
human nature."

We believe that it is under the impulse of such feelings that they have flocked to our columns--that the sentiment has found its echo in the breast of the public, and hence that success which has attended our humble efforts. The cause is so great, that we may well be pardoned if we boast that we have had both hand and heart in it. {130}

And so, with all the earnestness and heartiness which befit this happy season, when

"No spirit stirs abroad;
The nights are wholesome; when no planet strikes,
No fairy takes, no witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time,"

do we greet all our friends, whether contributors or readers, with the good old English wish,

A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

* * * * *

SIR E. DERING'S HOUSEHOLD BOOK.

The muniment chests of our old established families are seldom without their quota of "household books." Goodly collections of these often turn up, with records of the expenditure and the "doings" of the household, through a period of two or more centuries. These documents are of incalculable value in giving us a complete insight into the domestic habits of our ancestors. Many a note is _there_, well calculated to illustrate the pages of the dramatist or the biographer, and even the accuracy of the historian's statements may often be tested by some of the details which find their way into these accounts; as for the more peculiar province of the antiquary, there is always a rich store of materials. Every change of costume is _there_; the introduction of new commodities, new luxuries, and new fashions, the varying prices of the passing age. Dress in all its minute details, modes of travelling, entertainments, public and private amusements, all, with their cost, are there: and last, though not least, touches of individual character ever and anon present themselves with the force of undisguised and undeniable truth. Follow the man through his pecuniary transactions with his wife and children, his household, his tenantry, nay, with himself, and you have more of his real character than the biographer is usually able to furnish. In this view, a man's "household book" becomes an impartial autobiography.

I would venture to suggest that a corner of your paper might sometimes be profitably reserved for "notes" from these household books; there can be little doubt that your numerous readers would soon furnish you with abundant contributions of most interesting matter.

While suggesting the idea, there happens to lie open before me the account-book of the first Sir Edward Dering, commencing with the day on which he came of age, when, though his father was still living, he felt himself an independent man.

One of his first steps, however, was to qualify this independence by marriage. If family tradition be correct, he was as heedless and impetuous in this the first important step of his life, as he seems to have been in his public career. The lady was Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Nicholas Tufton, afterwards created Earl of Thanet.

In almost the first page of his account-book he enters all the charges of this marriage, the different dresses he provided, his wedding presents, &c. As to his bride, the first pleasing intelligence which greeted the young knight, after passing his pledge to take her for "richer for poorer," was, that the latter alternative was his. Sir Nicholas had jockied the youth out of the promised "trousseau," and handed over his daughter to Sir Edward, with nothing but a few shillings in her purse. She came unfurnished with even decent apparel, and her new lord had to supply her forthwith with necessary clothing. In a subsequent page, when he comes to detail the purchases which he was, in consequence, obliged to make for his bride, he gives full vent to his feelings on this niggardly conduct of the father, and, in recording the costs of his own outfit, his very first words have a smack of bitterness in them, which is somewhat ludicrous--

"Medio de donte leporum
Surgit amari aliquid."

He seems to sigh over his own folly and vanity in preparing a gallant bridal for one who met it so unbecomingly.

"1619.

"My DESPERATE quarter! the 3d quarter from Michaelmas unto New Year's Day.

5 yards quarter of scarlett coloured satten for a doublett, and to line my cassocke, at 16s. per yard, 4£. 4s. 5 yards halfe of fine scarlett, at 55s. per yard, to make hose cassocke and cloake [sic] 14£. 7 yards dim of blacke rich velvett, att 24s. per yard, 9£. 22 ounces of blacke galloune lace 2£. 15s. Taffaty to line the doublett 17s. 5 [sic] grosse of buttons, at 8s. the grosse 1£. 4s. pinkinge and racing the doublett, and lininge of ye copell 8s. ffor embrioderinge doublett, copell, and scarfe, 2£. 10s. 5 dozen of small buttons 1s. 8d. Stickinge and sowing silke 14s. ffor cuttinge ye scallops 2s. holland to line the hose 5s. 6d. Dutch bays for the hose 4s. 6d. Pocketts to ye hose 10d. 2 dozen of checker riband pointes 12s. drawinge ye peeces in ye suite and cloake 5s. canvas and stiffninge to ye doublett 3s. 6d. ffor makinge ye doublett and hose 18s. making ye copell 1£. 8s. making ye cloake 9s.

Sum of this suite 40£. 2s."

I must not occupy more of your space this week by extending these extracts. If likely to supply useful "notes" to your readers, they shall have, in some future number, the remainder of the bridegroom's wardrobe. In whatever niggardly array the bride came to her lord's arms, he, at {131} least, was pranked and decked in all the apparel of a young gallant, an exquisite of the first water, for this was only one of several rich suits which he provided for his marriage outfit; and then follows a list of costly gloves and presents, and all the lavish outlay of this his "desperate quarter."

In some future number, too, if acceptable to your readers, you shall be furnished with a list of other and better objects of expenditure from this household book; for Sir Edward, albeit, as Clarendon depicts him, the victim of his own vanity, was worthy of better fame than is yet been his lot to acquire.

He was a most accomplished scholar and a learned antiquary. He had his foibles, it is true, but they were redeemed by qualities of high and enduring excellence. The eloquence of his parliamentary speeches has elicited the admiration of Southey; to praise them therefore now were superfluous. The noble library which he formed at Surrenden, and the invaluable collection of charters which he amassed there, during his unhappily brief career, testify to his ardour in literary pursuits. The library and a large part of the MSS. are unhappily dispersed. Of the former, all that remains to tell of what it once was, are a few scattered notices among the family records, and the titles of books, with their cost, as they are entered in the weekly accounts of our "household book." Of the latter there yet remain a few thousand charters and rolls, some of them of great interest, with exquisite seals attached. I shall be able occasionally to send you a few "notes" on these heads, from the "household book," and, in contemplating the remains of this unrivalled collection of its day, I can well bespeak the sympathy of every true-hearted "Chartist" and Bibliographer, in the lament which has often been mine--"Quanta fuisti cum tantæ sint reliquiæ!"

LAMBERT B. LARKING.

Ryarsh Vicarage, Dec. 12. 1849.

* * * * *

BERKELEY'S THEORY OF VISION VINDICATED.

In reply to the query of "B.G." (p. 107. of your 7th No.), I beg to say that Bishop Berkeley's _Theory of Vision Vindicated_ does not occur either in the 4to. or 8vo. editions of his collected works; but there is a copy of it in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, from which I transcribe the full title as follows:--

"The Theory of Vision, or Visual Language, shewing the immediate
Presence and Providence of a Deity, vindicated and explained. By
the author of Alciphron, or The Minute Philosopher.

"Acts, xvii. 28.

"_In Him we live, and move, and have our being_.

"Lond. Printed for J. Tonson in the Strand.

"MDCCXXXIII."

Some other of the author's tracts have also been omitted in his collected works; but, as I am now answering "a _Query_," and not making "a _Note_," I shall reserve what I might say of them for another opportunity. The memory of Berkeley is dear to every member of this University; and therefore I hope you will permit me to say one word, in defence of his character, against Dugald Stewart's charge of having been "provoked," by Lord Shaftesbury's _Characteristics_, "to a harshness equally unwonted and unwarranted."

Mr. Stewart can scarcely suppose to have seen the book upon which he pronounces this most "unwarranted" criticism. The tract was not written in reply to the _Characteristics_, but was an answer to an anonymous letter published in the _Daily Post-Boy_ of September 9th, 1732, which letter Berkeley has reprinted at the end of his pamphlet. The only allusion to the writer of this letter which bears the slightest tinge of severity occurs at the commencement of the tract. Those who will take the trouble of perusing the anonymous letter, will see that it was richly deserved; and I think it can scarcely, with any justice, be censured as unbecomingly harsh, or in any degree unwarranted. The passage is as follows:--

[After mentioning that an ill state of health had prevented his
noticing this letter sooner, the author adds,] "This would have
altogether excused me from a controversy upon points either
personal or purely speculative, or from entering the lists of
the declaimers, whom I leave to the triumph of their own
passions. And indeed, to one of this character, who contradicts
himself and misrepresents me, what answer can be made more than
to desire his readers not to take his word for what I say, but
to use their own eyes, read, examine, and judge for themselves?
And to their common sense I appeal."

The remainder of the tract is occupied with a philosophical discussion of the subject of debate, in a style as cool and as free from harshness as Dugald Stewart could desire, and containing, as far as I can see, nothing inconsistent with the character of him, who was described by his contemporaries as the possessor of "every virtue under heaven."

JAMES H. TODD.

Trin. Coll. Dublin, Dec. 20. 1849.

* * * * *

BISHOP BARNABY.

Mr. Editor,--Allow me, in addition to the Note inserted in your 4th Number, in answer to the Query of LEGOUR, by your correspondent (and I believe my friend) J.G., to give the following extract from Forby's _Vocabulary of East Anglia_:--

"Bishop Barnabee-s. The pretty insect more generally called the
Lady-bird, or May-bug. It is one of those highly favoured among
God's harmless creatures which superstition protects from wanton
injury. Some obscurity seems to hang over this popular name
{132} of it. It has certainly no more relation to the companion
of St. Paul than to drunken Barnaby, though some have supposed
it has. It is sometimes called _Bishop Benebee_, which may
possibly have been intended to mean the _blessed bee_; sometimes
_Bishop Benetree_, of which it seems not possible to make any
thing. The name has most probably been derived from the
_Barn-Bishop_; whether in scorn of that silly and profane
mockery, or in pious commemoration of it, must depend on the
time of its adoption, before or since the Reformation; and it is
not worth inquiring. The two words are transposed, and _bee_
annexed as being perhaps thought more seemly in such a
connection than fly-bug or beetle. The dignified ecclesiastics
in ancient times wore brilliant mixtures of colours in their
habits. Bishops had scarlet and black, as this insect has on its
wing-covers. Some remains of the finery of the gravest
personages still exist on our academical robes of ceremony.
There is something inconsistent with the popish episcopal
character in the childish rhyme with which _Bishop Barnabee_ is
thrown up and dismissed when he happens to light on any one's
hand. Unluckily the words are not recollected, nor at present
recoverable; but the purport of them is to admonish him to fly
home, and take care of his wife and children, for that his house
in on fire. Perhaps, indeed, the rhyme has been fabricated long
since the name by some one who did not think of such niceties."

G.A.C.

Sir,--In the explanation of the term Bishop Barnaby, given by J.G., the prefix "Bishop" seems yet to need elucidation. Why should it not have arisen from the insect's garb? The full dress gown of the Oxford D.D.--scarlet with black velvet sleeves--might easily have suggested the idea of naming the little insect "Dr. Burn bug," and the transition is easy to "Dr. Burnabee," or "Bishop Burnaby." These little insects, in the winter, congregate by thousands in barns for their long slumber till the reappearance of genial weather, and it is not impossible that, from this circumstance, the country people may have designated them "Barn bug," or "Barn bee."

L.B.L.

Sir,--I cannot inform LEGOUR why the lady-bird (the seven-spotted, _Coccinella Septempunctata_, is the most common) is called in some places "Bishop Barnaby." This little insect is sometimes erroneously accused of destroying turnips and peas in its larva state; but, in truth, both in the larva and perfect state it feeds exclusively on aphides. I do not know that it visits dairies, and Tusser's "Bishop that burneth," may allude to something else; still there appears some popular connection of the _Coccinellidæ_ with _cows_ as well as burning, for in the West Riding of Yorkshire they are called _Cush Cow Ladies_; and in the North Riding one of the children's rhymes anent them runs:--

"Dowdy-cow, dowdy-cow, ride away heame,
Thy[1] house is burnt, and thy bairns are tean,
And if thou means to save thy bairns
Take thy wings and flee away!"

The most mischievous urchins are afraid to hurt the dowdy-cow, believing if they did evil would inevitably befall them. It is tenderly placed on the palm of the hand--of a girl, if possible--and the above rhyme recited thrice, during which it usually spreads its wings, and at the last word flies away. A collection of nursery rhymes relating to insects would, I think, be useful.

W.G.M.J. BARKER.

[Footnote 1: _Thy_ is pronounced as _thee_.]

[We have received many other communications respecting the
epithet of this insect--so great a favourite with children.
ALICUI and several other correspondents incline to L.B.L.'s
opinion that it takes its name from a fancied resemblance of its
bright wing-cases to the episcopal cope or chasuble. J.T.
reminds us that St. Barnabas has been distinguished of old by
the title of _bright_, as in the old proverbial distich intended
to mark the day of his festival according to the Old Style (21st
June):--

"Barnaby bright!
The longest day and the shortest night."

While F.E. furnishes us with another and happier version of the
Norfolk popular rhyme:--

"Bishop, Bishop Barnabee,
Tell me when _my_ wedding be;
If it be to-morrow day,
Take your wings and fly away!
_Fly to the east, fly to the west_,
_Fly to them that I love best_!"

The name which this pretty insect bears in the various languages
of Europe is clearly mythic. In this, as in other cases, the
Virgin has supplanted Freya; so that _Freyjuhaena_ and
_Frouehenge_ have been changed into _Marienvoglein_, which
corresponds with _Our Lady's Bird_. There, can, therefore, be
little doubt that the esteem with which the lady-bird, or Our
Lady's cow, is still regarded, is a relic of the ancient cult.]

* * * * *

MATHEMATICAL ARCHÆOLOGY.

Sir,--I cannot gather from your "Notes" that scientific archæology is included in your plan, nor yet, on the other hand, any indications of its exclusion. Science, however, and especially mathematical science, has its archæology; and many doubtful points of great importance are amongst the "vexed questions" that can only be cleared up by _documentary evidence_. That evidence is more likely to be found mixed up amongst the masses of papers belonging to systematic collectors than amongst the papers of mere mathematicians--amongst men who never destroy a paper because they have no present use for it, or because the subject does not come within the range of their researches, than amongst men who value nothing but a "new theorem" or "an improved solution."

As a general rule I have always habituated myself to preserve every scrap of paper of any remote (and indeed recent) period, that had the appearance of being written by a literary man, whether I {133} knew the hand, or understood the circumstance to which it referred, or not. Such papers, whether we understand them or not, have a _possible value_ to others; and indeed, as my collections have always been at the service of my friends, very few indeed have been left in my hands, and those, probably, of no material value.

I wish this system were generally adopted. Papers, occasionally of great historical importance, and very often of archæological interest, would thus be preserved, and, what is more, _used_, as they would thus generally find their way into the right hands.

There are, I fancy, few classes of papers that would be so little likely to interest archæologists in general, as those relating to mathematics; and yet such are not unlikely to fall in their way, often and largely, if they would take the trouble to secure them. I will give an example or two, indicating the kind of papers which are desiderata to the mathematical historian.

1. A letter from Dr. Robert Simson, the editor of Euclid and the restorer of the Porisms, to John Nourse of the Strand, is missing from an otherwise unbroken series, extending from 1 Jan. 1751 to near the close of Simson's life. The missing letter, as is gathered from a subsequent one, is Feb. 5. 1753. A mere letter of business from an author to his publisher might not be thought of much interest; but it need not be _here_ enforced how much of consistency and clearness is often conferred upon a series of circumstances by matter which such a letter might contain. This letter, too, contains a problem, the nature of which it would be interesting to know. It would seem that the letter passed into the hands of Dodson, editor of the _Mathematical Repository_; but what became of Dodson's papers I could never discover. The uses, however, to which such an unpromising series of letters have been rendered subservient may be seen in the _Philosophical Magazine_, under the title of "Geometry and Geometers," Nos. ii. iii. and iv. The letters themselves are in the hands of Mr. Maynard, Earl's Court, Leicester Square.

2. Thomas Simpson (a name venerated by every geometer) was one of the scientific men consulted by the committee appointed to decide upon the plans for Blackfriars Bridge, in 1759 and 1760.

"It is probable," says Dr. Hutton, in his Life of Simpson,
prefixed to the _Select Exercises_, 1792, "that this reference
to him gave occasion to his turning his thoughts more seriously
to this subject, so as to form the design of composing a regular
treatise upon it: for his family have often informed me that he
laboured hard upon this work for some time before his death, and
was very anxious to have completed it, frequently remarking to
them that this work, when published, would procure him more
credit than any of his former publications. But he lived not to
put the finishing hand to it. Whatever he wrote upon this
subject probably fell, together with all his other remaining
papers, into the hands of Major Henry Watson, of the Engineers,
in the service of the India Company, being in all a large chest
full of papers. This gentleman had been a pupil of Mr.
Simpson's, and had lodged in his house. After Mr. Simpson's
death Mr. Watson prevailed upon the widow to let him have the
papers, promising either to give her a sum of money for them, or
else to print and publish them for her benefit. But nothing of
the kind was ever done; this gentleman always declaring, when
urged on this point by myself and others, that no use could be
made of any of the papers, owing to the very imperfect state in
which he said they were left. _And yet he persisted in his
refusal to give them up again._"

In 1780 Colonel Watson was recalled to India, and took out with him one of the most remarkable English mathematicians of that day, Reuben Burrow. This gentleman had been assistant to Dr. Maskelyne at the Royal Observatory; and to his care was, in fact, committed the celebrated Schehallien experiments and observations. He died in India, and, I believe, all his papers which reached England, as well as several of his letters, are in my possession. This, however, is no further of consequence in the present matter, than to give authority to a remark I am about to quote from one of his letters to his most intimate friend, Isaac Dalby. In this he says:--"Colonel Watson has out here a work of Simpson's on bridges, very _complete_ and _original_."

It was no doubt by his dread of the sleepless watch of Hutton, that so unscrupulous a person as Colonel Watson is proved to be, was deterred from publishing Simpson's work as his own.

The desideratum here is, of course, to find what became of Colonel Watson's papers; and then to ascertain whether this and what other writings of Simpson's are amongst them. A _really good_ work on the mathematical theory of bridges, if such is ever to exist, has yet to be published. It is, at the same time, very likely that his great originality, and his wonderful sagacity in all his investigations, would not fail him in this; and possibly a better work on the subject was composed ninety years ago than has yet seen the light--involving, perhaps, the germs of a totally new and more effective method of investigation.

I have, I fear, already trespassed too far upon your space for a single letter; and will, therefore, defer my notice of a few other desiderata till a future day.

T.S.D.

Shooter's Hill, Dec. 15. 1849.

* * * * *

SONG IN THE STYLE OF SUCKLING--THE TWO NOBLE KINSMEN.

The song in your second number, furnished by a correspondent, and considered to be in the style {134} of Suckling, is of a class common enough in the time of Charles I. George Wither, rather than Suckling, I consider as the head of a race of poets peculiar to that age, as "Shall I wasting in Despair" may be regarded as the type of this class of poems. The present instance I do not think of very high merit, and certainly not good enough for Suckling. Such as it is, however, with a few unimportant variations, it may be found at page 101. of the 1st vol. of _The Hive, a Collection of the most celebrated Songs_. My copy is the 2nd edit. London, 1724.

I will, with your permission, take this opportunity of setting Mr. Dyce right with regard to a passage in the _Two Noble Kinsmen_, in which he is only less wrong than all his predecessors. It is to be found in the second scene of the fourth act, and is as follows:--

"Here Love himself sits smiling:
Just such another wanton Ganymede
Set Jove afire with," &c.

One editor proposed to amend this by inserting the normative "he" after "Ganymede;" and another by omitting "with" after "afire." Mr. Dyce saw that both these must be wrong, as a comparison between two wanton Ganymedes, one of which sat in the coutenance of Arcite, could never have been intended;--another, something, if not Ganymede, was wanted, and he, therefore, has this note:--"The construction and meaning are, 'With just such another _smile_ (which is understood from the preceding 'smiling') wanton Ganymede set Jove afire." When there is a choice of nouns to make intelligible sense, how can that one be understood which is not expressed? It _might_ be "with just such another _Love_;" but, as I shall shortly show, no conjecture on the subject is needed. The older editors were so fond of mending passages, that they did not take ordinary pains to understand them; and in this instance they have been so successful in sticking the epithet "wanton" to Ganymede, that even Mr. Dyce, with his clear sight, did not see that the very word he wanted was the next word before him. It puts one in mind of a man looking for his spectacles who has them already across his nose. "Wanton" is a noun as well as an adjective; and, to prevent it from being mistaken for an epithet applied to Ganymede, it will in future be necessary to place after it a _comma_, when the passage will read thus:--

"Here Love himself sits smiling.
Just such another wanton," (as the aforesaid smiling Love) "Ganymede
Set Jove afire with," &c.

The third act of the same play commences thus:--

"The duke has lost Hippolita; each took
A several land."

Mr. Dyce suspects that for "land" we should read "laund," an old form of lawn. "Land" being either wrong, or having a sense not understood now, we must fall back on the general sense of the passage. When people go a hunting, and don't keep together, it is very probable that they may take a several "direction." Now _hand_ means "direction," as we say "to the right" or "left hand." It is not, therefore, probable, that we should read "a several hand?"

SAMUEL HICKSON

* * * * *

"GOTHIC" ARCHITECTURE

It would require more space than you could allot to the subject, to explain, at much length, "the origin, as well as the date, of the introduction of the term '_Gothic_,' as applied to pointed styles of ecclesiastical architecture," required by R. Vincent, of Winchester, in your Fourth Number. There can be no doubt that the term was used at first contemptuously, and in derision, by those who were ambitious to imitate and revive the Grecian orders of architecture, after the revival of classical literature. But, without citing many authorities, such as Christopher Wren, and others, who lent their aid in depreciating the old mediæval style, which they termed Gothic, as synonymous with every thing that was barbarous and rude, it may be sufficient to refer to the celebrated Treatise of Sir Henry Wotton, entitled _The Elements of Architecture_, 4to., printed in London so early as 1624. This work was so popular, that it was translated into Latin, and annexed to the works of Vitruvius, as well as to Freart's _Parallel of the Ancient Architecture with the Modern_. Dufresnoy, also, who divided his time between poetry and painting, and whose work on the latter art was rendered popular in this country by Dryden's translation, uses the term "_Gothique_" in a bad sense. But it was a strange misapplication of the term to use it for the pointed style, in contradistinction to the circular, formerly called Saxon, now Norman, Romanesque, &c. These latter styles, like Lombardic, Italian, and the Byzantine, of course belong more to the Gothic period than the light and elegant structures of the pointed order which succeeded them. Felibien, the French author of the _Lives of Architects_, divides Gothic architecture into two distinct kinds--the _massive_ and the _light_; and as the latter superseded the former, the term Gothic, which had been originally applied to both kinds, seems to have been restricted improperly to the latter only. As there is now, happily, no fear of the word being understood in a bad sense, there seems to be no longer any objection to the use of it in a good one, whatever terms may be used to discriminate all the varieties of the style observable either at home or abroad.

J.I.

Trinity College, Oxford.

* * * * * {135}

DR. BURNEY'S MUSICAL WORKS.

Mr. Editor,--On pp. 63. and 78. of your columns inquiry is made for Burney's _Treatise on Music_ (not his _History_). Before correspondents trouble you with their wants, I think they should be certain that the books they inquire for have existence. Dr. Burney never published, or wrote, a _Treatise on Music_. His only works on the subject (the _General History of Music_ excepted) are the following:--

"The Present State of Music in France and Italy. 8vo. 1771.

"The Present State of Music in Germany, the Netherlands, and
United Provinces. 2 vols. 8vo. 1775.

"An Account of the Musical Performances in Westminster Abbey,
and the Pantheon, &c. in Commemoration of Handel. 4to. 1785.

"A Plan for the Formation of a Musical Academy, 8vo. n. d."

As your "NOTES AND QUERIES" will become a standard book of reference, strict accuracy on all points is the grand desideratum.

EDW. F. RIMBAULT.

P.S. I might, perhaps, have included in the above list the _Life of Metastasio_, which, although not generally classed among musical works, forms an admirable supplement to the _General History of Music_.

E.F.R.

* * * * *

ANCIENT INSCRIBED DISHES.

Judging from the various notices in your Nos. 3, 5, and 6, the dishes and inscriptions mentioned therein by CLERICUS, L.S.B., &c., pp. 44. 73. 87., are likely to cause as much speculation here as they have some time experienced on the continent. They were there principally figured and discussed in the _Curiositãten_, a miscellaneous periodical, conducted from about 1818 to 1825, by Vulpius, brother-in-law of Göthe, librarian to the Grand Duke of Saxe Weimar. Herr v. Strombeck, Judge of the Supreme Court of Appeal at Wolfenbüttel, first noticed them from a specimen belonging to the church of a suppressed convent at Sterterheim near Brunswick, and they were subsequently pounced upon by Joseph v. Hammer (now v. Purgstall), the learned orientalist of Vienna, as one of the principal proofs which he adduced in his _Mysterium Baphometis Revelatum_ in one of the numbers of the _Fundgruben (Mines) des Orients_, for the monstrous impieties and impurities which he, Nicolai, and others, falsely attributed to the Templars. Comments upon these dishes occur in other works of a recent period, but having left my portfolio, concerning them, with other papers, on the continent, I give these hasty notices entirely from memory. They are by no means uncommon now in England, as the notices of your correspondents prove. A paper on three varieties of them at Hull was read in 1829, to the Hull Literary and Philosophical Society. In Nash's _Worcestershire_ one is depicted full size, and a reduced copy given about this period in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, and Nash first calls them "Offertory Dishes." The Germans call them Taufbecken, or baptismal basins; but I believe the English denomination more correct, as I have a distinct recollection of seeing, in a Catholic convent at Danzig, a similar one placed on Good Friday before the tomb of the interred image of the Saviour, for the oblations for which it was not too large. Another of them is kept upon the altar of Boroughbridge Church (N. Riding of Yorkshire), but sadly worn down by scrubbing to keep it bright, and the attempt at a copy of the Inscription in a Harrowgate Guide is felicitously ludicrous: it is there taken as a relic of the Roman Isurium on the same spot. Three others were observed some years ago in a neglected nook of the sacristy of York Cathedral. At the last meeting of the Institute at Salisbury, a number of these were exhibited in St. John's House there, but I believe without any notice taken of them in its Proceedings; and another was shown to the Archæological Society, at their last Chester Congress, by Colonel Biddulph, at Chirk Castle; when more were mentioned by the visitors as in their possession, anxious as your correspondents to know the import of the inscriptions. They are sometimes seen exposed in the shops of Wardour Street, and in other curiosity shops of the metropolis.

On their sunken centres all have religious types: the most common is the temptation of Eve; the next in frequency, the Annunciation; the Spies sent by Joshua returning with an immense bunch of grapes suspended betwixt them, is not unfrequent; but non-scriptural subjects, as the Martyrdom of St. Sebastian, mentioned by L.S.B., is a variety I have not before observed.

The inscriptions vary, and are sometimes double in two concentral rings. The most usual is that alluded to by your correspondents, and though obviously German, neither old nor obsolete; having been viewed even by native decipherers, through the mist of a preconceived hypothesis, have never yet been by them satisfactorily accounted for. It is always repeated four times, evidently from the same slightly curved die; when, however, the enlarged circumference of the circle required more than this fourfold repetition to go round it, the die was set on again for as much of a fifth impression as was necessary: this was seldom more than four or five letters, which, as pleonastic or intercalary, are to be carefully rejected in reading the rest; their introduction has confused many expositors.

The readings of some of your correspondents who understand German is pretty near the truth. {136} I have before said that the centre type of Eve's Temptation is the most common, and to it the words especially refer, and seem at the place of their manufacture (most probably Nuremburg) to have been used for other centres without any regard to its fitness. The letters, as I can safely aver from some very perfect specimens, are

DER SELEN INFRID WART;

in modern German "_der Seelen Infried wort_." To the German scholar the two latter words only require explanation. _Infrid_ for Unfried, discord, disturbance, any thing in opposition to Frieden or peace. The Frid-stools at Beverley, Ripon, and Hexham, still bear the old theotise stamp. _Wart_, or _ward_, may be either the past tense of _werden_, to be (our was), or an old form of _währen_, to endure, to last: our English _wear_ is the same word. The sense is pretty much the same in both readings alluding to Eve. In the first:

(By her) the soul's disturbance came (was).

By the second:

(Through her) the soul's disturbance continues.

I may here observe that the words ICH WART are particularly distinct on a helmet, pictured in the Journal of the British Archæological Association, which the Secretary, Mr. Planche, in such matters the highest authority, regards as a tilting helmet. It may there have been in the original ICH WARTE, meaning I bide (my time).

But the centres and this inscription are the least difficulty. A second, frequently met with, is by far more puzzling. I could not give your readers any idea of it without a drawing: however it is found imperfectly depicted on the plates I have before mentioned in Nash's _Worcestershire_, and the _Gentleman's Magazine_, and I think I recollect also a very rude copy in a volume of Hearne's _Miscellaneous Works_, which I examined in the Gottingen Library, but whether belonging to the work or a MS. addition I cannot now call to mind. The fanciful and flowery form of its letters gives great scope to the imagination in assigning them their particular position in the alphabet, and the difficulty of reading them is enhanced by the doubts of German archæologists whether they are initials or component parts of a sentence. Herr Joseph v. Hammer Purgstall, however, in his version RECORD DE SCI GNSI, or in full _Recordamini de sancta Gnosi_, deduces thence his principal proof of Gnostic heresy amongst the calumniated Templars, in which I am sorry to say he has been too servilely followed in England: e.g. by Mr. Godfrey Higgins, in his posthumous _Anaclypsis_ (p. 830 note), as well as by E.G. Addison, _The Temple Church_ (p. 57), and by Mr. R.W. Billings more especially, who tacks to his account of this building an "Essay on the symbolical Evidences of the Temple Church, where the Templars are proved Gnostic Idolators, as alleged by Edward Clarkson, Esq." Had the learnedly hypothetic Austrian seen the engravings of the Crypt at Canterbury Cathedral (_Archæologia_, viii. p. 74.), and Ledwick's remarks on it in conjunction with the carvings at Glendalloch (_History of Ireland_, p. 174.), or those of Grymbald's Crypt at Oxford, he might have been expected to have attributed their monstrosities to his order, with as little hesitation and as thorough a contempt of chronology, or proved connection, as he has the curious and innocent sculptures of the church at Schöngrabern in Bohemia (vide _Curiositäten_, vol. viii. p. 501.).

WILLIAM BELL, Phil. Dr.

* * * * *

MINOR NOTES.

_Prince Modoc._--At p. 57., "ANGLO-CAMBRIAN" refers to the report of the Proceedings of the British Association at Swansea, in Aug. 1848, extracted from the _Athenæum_ newspaper. In the course of a discussion which took place on Prof. Elton's address, it was observed (if I recollect rightly) by the learned Dr. Latham, that a vocabulary of the so-called Welsh-Indian dialect has been formed, and that it contains _no trace_ of any Celtic root.

J.M.T. December 10. 1849.

_St. Barnabas._--About the time of the Reformation, it was strongly debated whether the festival days of St. Paul and St. Barnabas should be admitted into the calendar; and, in the 2d Book of K. Edward, the conversion of St. Paul is put down in _black_, and St. Barnabas is _omitted altogether_! No wonder, therefore, if, in Suffolk, liberties were taken with the name of St. Barnabas, and it was transferred to doggerel rhyme, to be repeated by children.

J.I.

_Register of Cromwell's Baptism._--The communication of your correspondent C.W.G. at p. 103. of your last number, induces me to offer you the inclosed copy from the _Register_ of All Saints' Church, Huntingdon, of the birth and baptism of Oliver Cromwell:--

"Anno Domini 1599 Oliverus filius Roberti Cromwell generosi et
Elisabethæ huxoris ejus Natus vicesimo quinto die Aprilis et
Baptisatus vicesimo nono ejusdem mensis."

Then follow the words "England's plague for many years," written in a different hand.

R.O.

_The Times._--A correspondent (NASO) informs us of the following fact in the history of this widely circulated and influential journal; namely, that it is stated in that the paper of the 12th of March, 1788, that it was printed "Logographically!" We wish our correspondent had furnished us with the precise words of this very curious statement. {137}

_Roland Monoux._--I have in my possession a brass monumental plate, said to have been taken from some church in Middlesex, and bearing the following lines, engraved in _black letter_:--

"Behold what droupinge Dethe maye doe, consume
y'e corse to duste,
What Dethe maie not shall lyue for aye, in spite of
Dethe his luste;
Thoughe Rouland Monoux shrowdeth here, yet
Rouland Monoux lives,
His helpynge hand to nedys want, a fame for ever
geves;
Hys worde and dede was ever one, his credyth never
quaylde,
His zeall' to Christ was stronge, tyll' dethe w'th latest
panges asaylde.
Twyse thre and one he Children had, two sones, one
kepes his name,
And dowghters fyve for home he carde, y't lyve in
honest fame.
What booteth more, as he be kynde dyd come of
Jentyll race,
So Rouland Monoux good Desertes this grave can
not Deface."

I should be obliged to any of your readers for some account of this Rouland Monoux, and when he died. I may also add; that I should be very willing to restore the brass to its original site, did I know the spot from whence it has been sacrilegiously torn.