Chapter I: Front Matter

Transcriber's note: A few typographical errors have been corrected: they are listed at the end of the text.

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NOTES AND QUERIES:

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

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

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No. 188.] Saturday, June 4, 1853. [Price Fourpence. Stamped Edition 5d.

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CONTENTS.

NOTES:-- Page
Corrections adopted by Pope from the Dunces, by James
Crossley 541

Notes on several misunderstood Words, by the Rev.
W. R. Arrowsmith 542

Devonianisms 544

The Poems of Rowley, by Henry H. Breen 544

FOLK LORE:--Legend of Llangefelach Tower--Wedding
Divination 545

Shakspeare Correspondence:--Shakspearian Drawings
--Thomas Shakspeare--Passage in Macbeth, Act I.
Sc. 5.--"Discourse of Reason" 545

MINOR NOTES:--The MSS. of Gervase Hollis--Anagrams
--Family Caul--Numerous Progeny 546

QUERIES:--

Smith, Young, and Scrymgeour MSS. 547

Mormon Publications, by W. Sparrow Simpson 548

MINOR QUERIES:--Dimidiation--Early Christian
Mothers--The Lion at Northumberland House--The
Cross in Mexico and Alexandria--Passage in St. James
--"The Temple of Truth"--Santa Claus--Donnybrook
Fair--Saffron, when brought into England--
Isping Geil--Humbug--Franklyn Household Book--
James Thomson's Will--"Country Parson's Advice
to his Parishioners"--Shakspeare: Blackstone 548

MINOR QUERIES WITH ANSWERS:--Turkey Cocks--
Bishop St. John--Ferdinand Mendez Pinto--Satin--
Carrier Pigeons 550

REPLIES:--

"Pylades and Corinna:" Psalmanazar and Defoe, by
James Crossley 551

Robert Wauchope, Archbishop of Armagh 552

Seal of William d'Albini, by E. G. Ballard, &c. 552

"Will" and "Shall," by William Bates, &c. 553

Inscriptions in Books, by Honore de Mareville, &c. 554

Bacon's "Advancement of Learning," by Thomas
Markby 554

PHOTOGRAPHIC CORRESPONDENCE:--Test for a good
Lens--Photography and the Microscope--Cement for
Glass Baths--Mr. Lyte's Mode of Printing 555

REPLIES TO MINOR QUERIES:--Eulenspiegel or Ulenspiegel
--Lawyers' Bags--"Nine Tailors make a man"
--"Time and I"--Carr Pedigree--Campvere, Privileges
of--Haulf-naked--Old Picture of the Spanish
Armada--Parochial Libraries--How to stain Deal--
Roger Outlawe--Tennyson--Old Fogie--Errata corrigenda
--Anecdote of Dutens--Gloves at Fairs--
Arms: Battle-axe--Enough--Feelings of Age--Optical
Query--Cross and Pile, &c. 557

MISCELLANEOUS:--

Notes on Books, &c. 561

Books and Odd Volumes wanted 562

Notices to Correspondents 562

Advertisements 562

* * * * *

Notes.

CORRECTIONS ADOPTED BY POPE FROM THE DUNCES.

In Pope's "Letter to the Honourable James Craggs," dated June 15, 1711, after making some observations on Dennis's remarks on the _Essay on Criticism_, he says--

"Yet, to give this man his due, he has objected to one or two lines
with reason; and I will alter them in case of another edition: I will
make my enemy do me a kindness where he meant an injury, and so serve
instead of a friend."

An interesting paper might be drawn up from the instances, for they are rather numerous, in which Pope followed out this very sensible rule. I do not remember seeing the following one noted. One of the heroes of the _Dunciad_, Thomas Cooke, the translator of Hesiod, was the editor of a periodical published in monthly numbers, in 8vo., of which nine only appeared, under the title of _The Comedian, or Philosophical Inquirer_, the first number being for April, and the last for December, 1732. It contains some curious matter, and amongst other papers is, in No. 2., "A Letter in Prose to Mr. Alexander Pope, occasioned by his Epistle in Verse to the Earl of Burlington." It is very abusive, and was most probably written either by Cooke or Theobald. After quoting the following lines as they then stood:

"He buys for Topham drawings and designs,
For Fountain statues, and for Curio coins,
Rare monkish manuscripts for Hearne alone,
And books for Mead, and rarities for Sloane,"

the letter-writer thus unceremoniously addresses himself to the author:

"Rarities! how could'st thou be so silly as not to be particular in the
rarities of Sloane, as in those of the other five persons? What
knowledge, what meaning is conveyed in the word _rarities_? Are not
some drawings, some statues, some coins, all monkish manuscripts, and
some books, _rarities_? Could'st thou not find a trisyllable to express
some parts of nature for a collection of which that learned and worthy
physician is eminent? Fy, fy! correct and write--

'Rare monkish manuscripts for Hearne alone,
And books for Mead, and butterflies for Sloane.'

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"Sir Hans Sloane is known to have the finest collection of butterflies
in England, and perhaps in the world; and if rare monkish manuscripts
are for Hearne only, how can rarities be for Sloane, unless thou
specifyest what sort of rarities? O thou numskull!"--No. 2., pp.
15--16.

The correction was evidently an improvement, and therefore Pope wisely accepted the benefit, and was the channel through which it was conveyed; and the passage accordingly now stands as altered by the letter-writer.

JAMES CROSSLEY.

* * * * *

NOTES ON SEVERAL MISUNDERSTOOD WORDS.

(_Continued from_ p. 522.)

_Dare_, to lurk, or cause to lurk; used both transitively and intransitively. Apparently the root of _dark_ and _dearn_.

"Here, quod he, it ought ynough suffice,
Five houres for to slepe upon a night:
But it were for an olde appalled wight,
As ben thise wedded men, that lie and _dare_,
As in a fourme sitteth a wery hare."

Tyrwhitt's utterly unwarranted adoption of Speght's interpretation is "_Dare_, v. Sax. to stare." The reader should always be cautious how he takes upon trust a glossarist's sly fetch to win a cheap repute for learning, and over-ride inquiry by the mysterious letters Sax. or Ang.-Sax. tacked on to his exposition of an obscure word. There is no such Saxon vocable as _dare_, to stare. Again, what more frequent blunder than to confound a secondary and derivative sense of a word with its radical and primary--indeed, sometimes to allow the former to usurp the precedence, and at length altogether oust the latter: hence it comes to pass, that we find _dare_ is one while said to imply peeping and prying, another while trembling or crouching; moods and actions merely consequent or attendant upon the elementary signification of the word:

"I haue an hoby can make larkys to _dare_."
Skelton's _Magnifycence_, vol. i. p.269. l. 1358., Dyce's edition;

on which line that able, but therein mistaken editor's note is, "_to dare_, i. e. to be terrified, to tremble" (he however also adds, it means to lurk, to lie hid, and remits his reader to a note at p. 379., where some most pertinent examples of its true and only sense are given), to which add these next:

" . . let his grace go forward,
And _dare_ vs with his cap, like larkes."
First Fol., _Henry VIII._, Act III, Sc. 2.

"Thay questun, thay quellun,
By frythun by fellun,
The dere in the dellun,
Thay droupun and _daren_".
_The Anturs of Arthur at the Tarnewathelan_,
St. IV. p. 3. Camden Society's Publications.

"She sprinkled vs with bitter juice of vncouth herbs, and strake
The awke end of hir charmed rod vpon our heades, and spake
Words to the former contrarie. The more she charm'd, the more
Arose we vpward from the ground on which we _darde_ before."
The XIIII. Booke of Ouid's _Metamorphosis_,
p. 179. Arthur Golding's translation: London, 1587.

"Sothely it _dareth_ hem weillynge this thing; that heuenes weren
before," &c.

And again, a little further on:

"Forsothe yee moste dere, one thing _dare_ you nougt (or be not
unknowen): for one day anentis God as a thousande yeeris, and a
thousande yeer as one day."--_C^m 3^m Petre 2._, Wycliffe's
translation:

in the Latin Vulgate, _latet_ and _lateat_ respectively; in the original, [Greek: lanthanei] and [Greek: lanthaneto]. Now the book is before me, I beg to furnish MR. COLLIER with the references to his usage of _terre_, mentioned in Todd's _Dictionary_, but not given (Collier's _Shakspeare_, vol. iv. p. 65., note), namely, 6th cap. of Epistle to Ephesians, _prop. init._; and 3rd of that to Colossians, _prop. fin._

* * * * *

_Die and live._--This _hysteron proteron_ is by no means uncommon: its meaning is, of course, the same as live and die, _i. e._ subsist from the cradle to the grave:

" . . . Will you sterner be.
Than he that _dies and lives_ by bloody drops?"
First Fol., _As You Like It_, Act III. Sc. 5.

All manner of whimsical and farfetched constructions have been put by the commentators upon this very homely sentence. As long as the question was, whether their wits should have licence to go a-woolgathering or no, one could feel no great concern to interfere: but it appears high time to come to Shakspeare's rescue, when MR. COLLIER'S "clever" old commentator, with some little variation in the letters, and not much less in the sense, reads "kills" for dies; but then, in the _Merry Wives of Windsor_, Act II. Sc. 3., the same "clever" authority changes "cride-game (cride I ame), said I well?" into "curds and cream, said I well?"--an alteration certainly not at odds with the host's ensuing question, "said I well?" saving that that, to liquorish palate, might seem a rather superfluous inquiry.

"With sorrow they both _die and live_
That unto richesse her hertes yeve."
_The Romaunt of the Rose_, v. 5789-90.

"He is a foole, and so shall he _dye and liue_,
That thinketh him wise, and yet can he nothing."
_The Ship of Fooles_, fol. 67., by Alexander Barclay, 1570.

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"Behold how ready we are, how willingly the women of Sparta will _die
and live_ with their husbands."--_The Pilgrimage of Kings and Princes_,
p. 29.

Except in Shakspeare's behalf, it would not have been worth while to exemplify so unambiguous a phrase. The like remark may also be extended to the next word that falls under consideration.

* * * * *

_Kindly_, in accordance with kind, viz. nature. Thus, the love of a parent for a child, or the converse, is kindly: one without natural affection ([Greek: astorgos]) is unkind, kindless, as in--

"Remorselesse, treacherous, letcherous, _kindles_ villaine."
_Hamlet_, Act II. Sc. 2.

Thence _kindly_ expanded into its wider meaning of general benevolence. So under another phase of its primary sense we find the epithet used to express the excellence and characteristic qualities proper to the idea or standard of its subject, to wit, genuine, thrifty, well-liking, appropriate, not abortive, monstrous, prodigious, discordant. In the Litany, "the _kindly_ fruits of the earth" is, in the Latin versions "genuinus," and by Mr. Boyer rightly translated "les fruits de la terre chaqu'un selon son espece;" for which Pegge takes him to task, and interprets _kindly_ "fair and good," through mistake or preference adopting the acquired and popular, in lieu of the radical and elementary meaning of the word. (_Anonymiana_, pp. 380--1. Century VIII. No. LXXXI.) The conjunction of this adjective with _gird_ in a passage of _King Henry VI_. has sorely gravelled MR. COLLIER: twice over he essays, with equal success, to expound its purport. First, _loc. cit._, he finds fault with _gird_ as being employed in rather an unusual manner; or, if taken in its common meaning of taunt or reproof, then that _kindly_ is said ironically; because there seems to be a contradiction in terms. (Monck Mason's rank distortion of the words, there cited, I will not pain the reader's sight with.) MR. COLLIER'S note concludes with a supposition that _gird_ may possibly be a misprint. This is the misery! Men will sooner suspect the text than their own understanding or researches. In Act I. Sc. 1. of _Coriolanus_, dissatisfied with his previous note, MR. COLLIER tries again, and thinks a _kindly gird_ may mean a gentle reproof. That the reader may be able to judge what it does mean, it will be necessary to quote the king's _gird_, who thus administers a kindly rebuke to the malicious preacher against the sin of malice, _i.e._ chastens him with his own rod:

"_King._ Fie, uncle Beauford, I have heard you preach,
That mallice was a great and grievous sinne:
And will not you maintaine the thing you teache,
But prove a chief offender in the same?

_Warn._ Sweet king: the bishop hath a _kindly gyrd_."
First Part of _King Henry VI._, Act III. Sc. 1. 1st Fol.

A _gird_, akin to, in keeping with, fitting, proper to the cardinal's calling; an evangelical _gird_ for an evangelical man: what more _kindly_? _Kindly_, connatural, homogeneous. But now for a bushel of examples, some of which will surely avail to insense the reader in the purport of this epithet, if my explanation does not:

"God in the congregation of the gods, what more proper and
_kindly_"?--Andrewes' Sermons, vol. v. p. 212. _Lib. Ang.-Cath. Theol._

"And that (pride) seems somewhat _kindly_ too, and to agree with this
disease (the plague). That pride which swells itself should end in a
tumour or swelling, as, for the most part, this disease doth."--_Id._,
p. 228.

"And so, you are found; and they, as the children of perdition should
be, are lost. Here are you: and where are they? Gone to their own
place, to Judas their brother. And, as is most _kindly_, the sons to
the father of wickedness; there to be plagued with him for
ever."--_Id._, vol. iv. p. 98.

"For whatsoever, as the Son of God, He may do, it is _kindly_ for Him,
as the Son of Man, to save the sons of men."--_Id._, p. 253.

"There cannot be a more _kindly_ consequence than this, our not failing
from their not failing: we do not, because they do not."--_Id._, p.
273.

"And here falls in _kindly_ this day's design, and the visible 'per
me,' that happened on it."--_Id._, p. 289.

"And having then made them, it is _kindly_ that viscera misericordiae
should be over those opera that came de visceribus."--_Id._, p. 327.

"The children came to the birth, and the right and _kindly_ copulative
were; to the birth they came, and born they were: in a kind consequence
who would look for other?"--_Id._, p. 348.

"For usque adeo proprium est operari Spiritui, ut nisi operetur, nec
sit. So _kindly_ (proprium) it is for the spirit to be working as if It
work not, It is not."--_Id._, vol. iii. p. 194.

"And when he had overtaken, for those two are but presupposed, the more
_kindly_ to bring in [Greek: epelabeto], when, I say, He had overtaken
them, cometh in fitly and properly [Greek: epilambanetai]."--_Id._,
vol. i. p. 7.

"No time so _kindly_ to preach de Filio hodie genito as hodie."--_Id._,
p. 285.

"A day whereon, as it is most _kindly_ preached, so it will be most
_kindly_ practised of all others."--_Id._, p. 301.

"Respice et plange: first, 'Look and lament' or mourn; which is indeed
the most _kindly_ and natural effect of such a spectacle."--_Id._, vol.
ii. p. 130.

"Devotion is the most proper and most _kindly_ work of
holiness."--_Id._, vol. iv. p. 377.

Perhaps the following will be thought so apposite, that I may be spared the labour, and the reader the tedium of perusing a thousand other examples that might be cited:

And there is nothing more _kindly_ than for them that will be touching,
to be touched themselves, and to {544} be touched home, in the same
_kind_ themselves thought to have touched others."--_Id._, vol. iv. p.
71.[1]

W. R. ARROWSMITH.

(_To be continued._)

[Footnote 1: _Kindly_ is quite a pet word with Andrewes, as, besides the passages quoted, he employs it in nearly the same sense in vol. iii., at pp. 18. 34. 102. 161. 189. 262. 308. 372. 393. 397.; in vol. i., at pp. 100. 125. 151. 194. 214.; in vol. ii. at pp. 53. 157. 307. 313. 338. The same immortal quibbler is also very fond of the word _item_, using it, as our cousins across the Atlantic and we in Herefordshire do at the present day, for "a hint."]

* * * * *

DEVONIANISMS.

_Miserable._--_Miserable_ is very commonly used in Devonshire in the signification of _miserly_, with strange effect until one becomes used to it. Hooker the Judicious, a Devonshire man, uses the word in this sense in the _Eccl. Polity_, book v. ch. lxv. p. 21.:

"By means whereof it cometh also to pass that the mean which is virtue
seemeth in the eyes of each extreme an extremity; the liberal-hearted
man is by the opinion of the prodigal _miserable_, and by the judgment
of the _miserable_ lavish."

_Few._--Speaking of broth, people in Devon say a _few broth_ in place of a little, or some broth. I find a similar use of the word in a sermon preached in 1550, by Thomas Lever, Fellow of St. John's College, preserved by Strype (in his _Eccles. Mem._, ii. 422.). Speaking of the poor students of Cambridge, he says:

"At ten of the clock they go to dinner, whereas they be content with a
penny piece of beef among four, having a _few pottage_ made of the
broth of the same beef, with salt and oatmeal, and nothing else."

_Figs, Figgy._--Most commonly _raisins_ are called _figs_, and plum-pudding _figgy_ pudding. So with plum-cake, as in the following rhymes:--

"Rain, rain, go to Spain,
Never come again:
When I brew and when I bake,
I'll give you a _figgy_ cake."

_Against_ is used like the classical _adversum_, in the sense of _towards_ or _meeting_. I have heard, both in Devonshire and in Ireland, the expression to send _against_, that is, to send _to meet_, a person, &c.

The foregoing words and expressions are probably provincialisms rather than Devonianisms, good old English forms of expression; as are, indeed, many of the so-called Hibernicisms.

_Pilm, Farroll._--What is the derivation of _pilm_=dust, so frequently heard in Devon, and its derivatives, _pilmy_, dusty: it _pilmeth_? The cover of a book is there called the _farroll_; what is the derivation of this word?

J. M. B.

Tunbridge Wells.

* * * * *

THE POEMS OF ROWLEY.

The tests propounded by MR. KEIGHTLEY (Vol. vii. p. 160.) with reference to the authenticity of the poems of Rowley, namely the use of "its," and the absence of the feminine rhyme in _e_, furnish additional proof, if any were wanting, that Chatterton was the author of those extraordinary productions. Another test often insisted upon is the occurrence, in those poems, of borrowed thoughts--borrowed from poets of a date posterior to that of their pretended origin. Of this there is one instance which seems to have escaped the notice of Chatterton's numerous annotators. It occurs at the commencement of _The Tournament_, in the line,--

"The _worlde_ bie _diffraunce_ ys ynn _orderr_ founde."

It will be seen that this line, a very remarkable one, has been cleverly condensed from the following passage in Pope's _Windsor Forest_:--

"But as the _world_, harmoniously confused,
Where _order_ in variety we see;
And where, tho' all things _differ_, all agree."

This sentiment has been repeated by other modern writers. Pope himself has it in the _Essay on Man_, in this form,--

"The lights and shades, whose well-accorded strife
Gives all the strength and colour of our life."

It occurs in one of Pascal's _Pensees_:

"J'ecrirai ici mes pensees sans ordre, et non pas peut-etre dans une
confusion sans dessein: C'est le veritable ordre, et qui marquera
toujours mon objet par le desordre meme."

Butler has it in the line,--

"For discords make the sweetest airs."

Bernardin de St. Pierre, in his _Etudes de la Nature_:

"C'est des contraires que resulte l'harmonie du monde."

And Burke, in nearly the same words, in his _Reflections on the French Revolution_:

"You had that action and counteraction, which, in the natural and in
the political world, from the reciprocal struggle of discordant powers,
draws out the harmony of the universe."

Nor does the sentiment belong exclusively to the moderns. I find it in Horace's twelfth Epistle:

"Nil parvum sapias, et adhuc sublimia cures,
. . . . . .
Quid velit et possit rerum concordia discors."

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Lucan, I think, has the same expression in his _Pharsalia_; and it forms the basis of Longinus's remark on the eloquence of Demosthenes:

[Greek: "Oukoun ten men phusin ton epanaphoron kai asundeton pantei
phulattei tei sunechei metabolei? houtos autoi kai he taxis atakton,
kai empalin he ataxia poian perilambanei taxin."]

It may be said that, as Pope adopted the thought from Horace or Lucan, so a poet of the fifteenth century (such as the supposed Rowley) might have taken it from the same sources. But a comparison of the line in _The Tournament_ with those in _Windsor Forest_ will show that the borrowing embraces not only the thought, but the very words in which it is expressed.

HENRY H. BREEN.

St. Lucia.

* * * * *

FOLK LORE.

_Legend of Llangefelach Tower._--A different version of the legend also exists in the neighbourhood, viz. that the day's work on the tower being pulled down each night by the old gentleman, who was apparently apprehensive that the sound of the bells might keep away all evil spirits, a saint, of now forgotten name, told the people that if they would stand at the church door, and throw a stone, they would succeed in building the tower on the "spot where it fell," which accordingly came to pass.

CERIDWEN.

_Wedding Divination._--Being lately present on the occasion of a wedding at a town in the East Riding of Yorkshire, I was witness to the following custom, which seems to take rank as a genuine scrap of folk-lore. On the bride alighting from her carriage at her father's door, a plate covered with morsels of bride's cake was flung from a window of the second story upon the heads of the crowd congregated in the street below; and the divination, I was told, consists in observing the fate which attends its downfall. If it reach the ground in safety, without being broken, the omen is a most _un_favourable one. If on the other hand, the plate be shattered to pieces (and the more the better), the auspices are looked upon as most happy.

OXONIENSIS.

* * * * *

SHAKSPEARE CORRESPONDENCE.

_Shakspearian Drawings._--I have very recently become possessed of some curious drawings by Hollar; those relating to Shakspeare very interesting, evidently done for one Captain John Eyre, who could himself handle the pencil well.

The inscription under one is as follows, in the writing of the said J. Eyre:

"Ye house in ye Clink Streete, Southwarke, now belonging to Master
Ralph Hansome, and in ye which Master Shakspeare lodged in ye while he
writed and played at ye Globe, and untill ye yeare 1600 it was at the
time ye house of Grace Loveday. Will had ye two Rooms over against ye
Doorway, as I will possibly show."

Size of the drawing, 12 x 7, "W. Hollar delin., 1643." It is an exterior view, beautifully executed, showing very prominently the house and a continuation of houses, forming one side of the street.

The second has the following inscription in the same hand:

"Ye portraiture of ye rooms in ye which Master Will Shakspeare lodged
in Clink Streete, and which is told to us to be in ye same state as
when left by himself, as stated over ye door in ye room, and on the
walls were many printed verses, also a portraiture of Ben Jonson with a
ruff on a pannel."

Size of the drawing 11-5/8 x 6-7/8, "W. Hollar delin., 1643:" shows the interior of three sides, and the floor and ceiling, with the tables, chairs, and reading-desk; an open door shows the interior of his sleeping-room, being over the entrance door porch.

The third--

"Ye Globe, as to be seen before ye Fire in ye year 1615, when this
place was burnt down. This old building," &c.

Here follows a long interesting description. It is an exterior view; size of drawing 71/4 wide x 9-7/8 high, "W. H. 1640."

The fourth shows the stage, on which are two actors: this drawing, 7-7/8 x 61/2, was done by J. Eyre, 1629, and on which he gives a curious description of his accompanying Prince Charles, &c.; at this time he belonged to the Court, as he also accompanied that prince to Spain.

The fifth, done by the same hand in a _most masterly manner_, pen and ink portrait of Shakspeare, copied, as he writes, from a portrait belonging to the Earl of Essex, with interesting manuscript notice.

The sixth, done also by J. Eyre:

"Ye portraiture of one Master Ben Jonson, as on ye walls of Master Will
Shakspeare's rooms in Clinke Streete, Southwarke."--J. E. 1643.

The first three, in justice to Hollar, independent of the admirers of the immortal bard and lovers of antiquities, should be engraved as "Facsimiles of the Drawings." This shall be done on my receiving the names of sixty subscribers, the amount of subscription one guinea, for which each subscriber will receive three engravings, to be paid for when delivered.

P. T.

P. S.--These curious drawings may be seen at No. 1. Osnaburgh Place, New Road.

_Thomas Shakspeare._--From a close examination of the documents referred to (as bearing the signature of Thomas Shakspeare) in my last {546} communication to "N. & Q.," Vol. vii., p. 405.), and from the _nature_ of the _transaction_ to which they relate, _my impression_ is, that he was by profession a money scrivener in the town of Lutterworth; a circumstance which may possibly tend to the discovery of his family connexion (if any existed) with William Shakspeare.

CHARLECOTE.

_Passage in Macbeth, Act I. Sc. 5._--

" . . . Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor heaven peep through the _blanket_ of the dark,
To cry, Hold, hold!"

In MR. PAYNE COLLIER'S _Notes and Emendations_, p. 407., we are informed that the old corrector substitutes _blankness_ for _blanket_. The change is to me so exceedingly bad, even if made on some sort of authority (as an extinct 4to.), that I should have let it be its own executioner, had not MR. COLLIER apparently given in his adhesion to it. I now beg to offer a few obvious reasons why _blanket_ is unquestionably Shakspeare's word.

In the _Rape of Lucrece_, Stanza CXV., we have a passage very nearly parallel with that in _Macbeth_:

"O night, thou furnace of foul reeking smoke,
Let not the jealous day behold thy face,
Which underneath thy _black all-hiding cloak_,
Immodestly lies martyr'd with disgrace."

In _Lucrece_, the _cloak_ of night is invoked to screen a deed of adultery; in _Macbeth_ the _blanket_ of night is invoked to hide a murder: but the foul, reeking, smoky cloak of night, in the passage just quoted, is clearly parallel with the smoky blanket of night in _Macbeth_. The complete imagery of both passages has been happily caught by Carlyle (_Sartor Resartus_, 1841, p. 23.), who, in describing night, makes Teufelsdroeckh say:

"Oh, under that _hideous coverlet of vapours, and putrefactions, and
unimaginable gases_, what a fermenting-vat lies simmering and hid!"