Chapter C: Forbes

Temple.

_Anagrams_ (Vol. iv., pp. 226. 297.).--MR. BREEN put another Query besides "Where shall we find six good anagrams?" He asked, "How comes it that a species of composition once so popular should have become extinct?"

Let me venture to refer MR. BREEN to _The Spectator_ for an answer to this inquiry; where, in Addison's brilliant papers on "False Wit" (Nos. 58. &c.), he will find the whole family of ingenious quibblings,--anagrams, acrostics, chronograms, puns, bouts-rimes, &c.,--mown down to their just level. And MR. BREEN cannot, I am sure, as a man of taste, fail to be delighted, even although he may think the following passage (which I quote chiefly as a warning against the rise of an anagrammatric epidemic among your correspondents) a little severe on his old friends:

"The acrostic was probably invented about the same time with the
anagram, though it is impossible to decide whether the inventor of
the one or the other were the greater blockhead."

It is a tempting folly I admit for an idle hour, and I must plead guilty to having (in consequence of MR. BREEN'S letter) wasted nearly a whole evening in discovering that

"NOTES AND QUERIES"
"Enquires on Dates!"

and also offers the following warning to its contributors--

"Send quite Reason;"

while as an encouragement it observes (so an ingenious friend informs us)--

"O send in a Request."

HERMES.

_Battle of Brunanburgh_ (Vol. iv., p. 249.).--The _Egils Saga_ describes the duel between the armies of Olaf and Athelstan to have been fought in a _champ clos_, inclosed with branches of hazel, upon a space called the Vinheidi, or _heidi_ of _Vin_, situate _near_ (vid) or _in_ (á) the Vinskogr, or forest of Vin. _Heidi_ is a rough open space, with scrubs or bushes, such as furze, juniper, broom, &c. The _heidi_ and the _skogr_ were distinct, the latter affording shelter to the fugitives from the former, p. 290. The text, both Norse and Latin, says, "Then he brought his army to the Vin-heidi. _A certain_ town stood towards the north of the heidi." But a various reading in the note says, "to the town of Vinheidi, which was to the north of the heidi." But it seems as unreasonable for the town to be called Vinheidi, as Vinskogr. _Vin_ should be taken for the name of the town, and the root of the other phrases. The downs or brakes called Vinheidi were inclosed with hazel, and lay between the forest, or skogr, and some river. The town, being Olaf's head quarters, lay north of them. Athelstan occupied the nearest town to the south of the heidi. [Query, whether south of the river?] The northern town Vin is no doubt the Weon from which the Weon-dune (downs of Weon, or heidi of Vin) was called. The other name given by Simeon Dunelmensis to that space is curious, as showing how well the spot was adapted for attack and pursuit, "eth-runnan-werc," that is, "facilis-ad-opus-currendi." The name Brunanburg, probably signifying "the town of bourns," or watercourses, is unequivocally that of a town. Since Olaf or Arlaf had his quarters at Vin, it was probably at that place where Athelstan was stationed. Find these two places, Vin the northern-most of the two, and find the river. The heidi and the skogr are probably grubbed and ploughed up.

A. N.

_Praed's Works_ (Vol. iv., p. 256.).--Some three years ago I saw a prospectus announcing that they would be published by Mr. Parker of Oxford, under the direction of Mrs. Praed; but I believe nothing has been done in the matter since.

W. J.

_Sir J. Davies_ (Vol. iv., p. 256.).--Messrs. Puttick and Simpson, 191. Piccadilly, have, or had recently, an original MS. of this eminent lawyer and poet. Perhaps L. GYFFES would learn something of it by communication with them, and, if curious, oblige your readers with an account of it.

R.

_Coins of Constantius Gallus_ (Vol. iv., p. 238.).--MR. TAYLOR appears to me not altogether correct in his distinctions of these coins. The name VAL. certainly generally denotes Constantius Chlorus, but there are coins of Constantius II. also with VAL. It is impossible for a practised numismatist to confound the coins of these emperors, not only from the difference of lettering and workmanship, but from the change in the size, thickness, &c. of the coins. I have coins of Constantius II. with VAL. bearing the same reverse as others with IVL. (PROVIDENTIAE CAESS) in my cabinet. I have also several coins of Constantius II. with P.F.AVG., which have A. behind the head. I refer above only to coins of bronze, second and third sizes; but I should suppose the rules would apply also to the gold coins. I see "NOTES AND QUERIES" only monthly, or I should have written sooner, but I hope not to be too late.

W. H. S.

Edinburgh.

_Passage in Sedley_ (Vol. iii., p. 476.).--

"Let fools the name of loyalty divide
Wise men and gods are on the strongest side."

I much fear your correspondent HENRY H. BREEN suggests an alteration in Sir Charles Sedley's couplet more favourable to the witty baronet's principles than facts will admit. It is too probable that he conceived the sentiment just as it stands; for we must remember that he belonged to that school of loose wits of the Restoration, who, "Regis ad exemplar," made a mock of all which tended to place "virtue" above "interest," or to make men "too fond of the right to pursue the expedient."

Charles II. and his long train of licentious courtiers now stand at the bar of history, and the verdict on him must be, that if he had a principle in latter life it was this,--that he would never endanger himself for any abstract rule of right; or as Sir W. Scott, in _Peveril_, accurately says: "he had sworn never to kiss the block on which his father suffered," when yielding to the current would save him from it; hence, there is too good reason to think that, in his estimation, and in the judgment of the school he formed, "loyalty" was "folly," and to take the strongest side "wisdom."

The reference in Sedley's couplet to the line--

"Victrix causa Diis placuit, sed victa Catoni"--

is too obvious to need notice; and it is but too certain that in the estimation of a courtier of Charles II., Cato dying for his country would be but "a fool for his pains." It is painful to be obliged to remind MR. BREEN that, in order to understand Sedley's meaning, we are not to look for what would be "most consistent with truth," but for what was most probably accordant with the lax morality of the author.

A. B. R.

Belmont, Oct. 6. 1851.

_Buxtorf's Translation of Elias Levita's "Tub Taam"_ (Vol. iv., p. 272.).--This work was printed at Venice in 1538, in 4to. Münster republished it in the next following year, with an epitome of its contents in Latin. (G. B. de' Rossi, _Dizionario Storico, &c._, art. "Levita.").

T. T.

Manchester.

_Stonehenge_ (Vol. iv., p. 57.).--P. P.'s objection to Sir R. C. Hoare's derivation of _Stonehenge_ seems hardly justifiable. Surely the horizontal stones there may be said to hang, [Greek: meteôroi], or [Greek: metarsioi], sublime: as in the case of "Rocq Pendant" of Alderney, the term "hanging" is loosely applied. That leans forth from the cliff at a considerable angle out of the perpendicular, and is "hanging," in another sense of the word, like the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and as, in another acceptation, the famous terrace gardens of Babylon are called the Hanging Gardens.

THEOPHYLACT.

_Glass in Windows formerly not a Fixture_ (Vol. iv., p. 99.).--Referring to this subject, allow me to add a Note I have from the will of Robert Birkes, of Doncaster, alderman, proved at York, July 30, 1590, in further illustration. The testator gives to his son Robert all "the seeling work and portalls" in and about the house where he dwelt, "with all doors, _glass windows_," &c., in full of his child's portion of his goods; and then his _house_ he gave to his wife for her life. If by "seeling work and portalls" are meant what we now understand by those terms, the above extract shows that other essential parts of a house besides glass windows were formerly considered as moveable chattels.

C. J.

_Fortune, infortune, fort une_ (Vol. iv., pp. 57. 142.).--The explanation offered by a writer in the _Magasin Pittoresque_ for 1850, seems perfectly clear without the proposed transposition of the adverb _fort_ into _fait_ of your correspondent D. C.

If the sentence be read according to the French explanation D. C. has quoted, viz. by reading _infortune_ as a verb, _fort_ the adverb to it, it must be plain that the reading of the sentence must be:

"Fortune fort infortune une."

(Fortune very much afflicts one.)

If we turned _fort_ into _fait_, it would entirely spoil the sentence.

Query, But _is_ "infortuner" to be found as a verb in any old dictionary? We have the adjective "infortuné," which looks much like a participle.

J. C. W.

Francis Terrace, Kentish Town.

_Matthew Paris's "Historia Minor"_ (Vol. iv., p. 209.).--MR. SANSOM will find the desired MS. in the British Museum, 14 C. vii. (Macray's _Manual of Brit. Hist._, p. 26. Lond. 1845.)

R. G.

In the Cottonian library, Claudius D. vi. 9., will be found "Abbreviatio compendiosa Chronicorum Angliæ, ab A'o 1000, ad A. 1255. Scripsit quidam ad calcem, 'Hic desinit Mat. Paris Historia Minor, quæ est epitome Majoris, quæ ad A.D. 1258 continuatur.'"

_The Bibliothecæ Regiæ_, 14 C. vii., contains "Historiæ M. Paris. Continuatio ad A.D. 1273, alia manu. De possessione hujus Codicis multa fuit altercatio." (See Warton's _History of English Poetry_, vol. i. p. lxxxviii. edit. 1840.) There are also MSS. at Corpus Christi College (No. 56.) and Ben'et College, Cambridge (No. 31.). Macray states, that the _Historia Minor_ was made out of the _Historia Major_ by Paris, both from Wendover to 1235, and his own large additions after that period.

J. Y.

Hoxton.

_Sanford's "Descensus"_ (Vol. iv., p. 232.).--The work of Hugo Sanfordus, _De Descensu Domini nostri Jesu Christi ad inferos_, was published as a separate work at Amsterdam in 1611, and its title is inserted in the printed catalogue of the Bodleian Library. Can ÆGROTUS give a specific reference to the book, page, and edition of Gale's _Court of the Gentiles_ in which it is spoken of, and also his authority for the statement that it was published in the works of a bishop who survived him?

TYRO.

_Death of Pitt_ (Vol. iv., p. 232.).--MR. NATHANIEL ELLISON will find in the _Memoirs of Lady Hester Stanhope_, vol. iii. p. 141., a passage which pretty nearly confirms the account of _the desertion of Pitt's death-bed_. She said that James, a servant, was the only person present with Pitt when he died, and that she herself was the last person who saw him alive except James. She also stated that Dr. Pretyman, who seems to have been in the house, was fast asleep at the time; and that Sir Walter Farquhar, the physician, was absent. The account of Pitt's last moments in Gifford's life of him, where a prayer for forgiveness, &c. is put into his mouth, she pronounced to be _all a lie_.

J. S. W.

Stockwell.

_History of Hawick_ (Vol iv., p. 233.).--In reply to the Query of your correspondent H. L., I have to inform him that there have been published two histories of Hawick, viz.,--

1. Robert Wilson's _Sketch of the History of Hawick_, a small 8vo. printed in 1825. It contains a notice of the altercations between the Abbot of Melrose and Langlands the Baron of Wilton, relative to the arrear of tithes due to the abbacy of Melrose. A copy of this work can be procured for about 5_s._

2. James Wilson's _Annals of Hawick, 1214-1814_, a small 8vo. printed in 1850. This work, under date 1494-5, has a notice of the murder of the chaplain by Langlands. This book can be had for 6_s._ 6_d._

A notice of the trial of Langlands for the murder will also be found in Pitcairn's _Criminal Trials_, vol. i. p. 20.

T. G. S.

Edinburgh, Oct. 6. 1851.

"_Prophecies of Nostradamus_" (Vol. iv., pp. 86. 140. 258.).--J. R. says that "the first edition of the _Prophecies of Nostradamus_ is not only in the National Library, but in several others, both in Paris and elsewhere." Does J. R. speak from personal observation or at second-hand? When I was in Paris I spent some hours in searching the catalogue and shelves of both the National Library and that of St. Geneviève, but I could find no edition of Nostradamus dated 1555 in either. To convince myself that my search had been accurate, I turned to _Nostradamus_, par Eugène Bareste, Paris, 1840, and there found it distinctly asserted that there is no copy of the first edition of the book (viz. that of 1555) _in any public library_ in Paris, and that the copy used in compiling that edition of 1840 was borrowed from a private collection. I cannot give the exact words of M. Bareste, as I only made a "Note" of their purport; but if J. R. will say upon what authority his statement as to this rare little book is based, I will certainly some day renew my search for it at the National Library.

H. C. DE ST. CROIX.

_Bourchier Family_ (Vol. iv., p. 233.).--Monuments, with inscriptions, to William Bourchier, Earl of Bath, 1623; Henry Bourchier, Earl of Bath; many of the family of Bourchier-Wrey, and others allied to them, are in the church of Tavistock, in the county of Devon; and the whole of them have been carefully transcribed with notes of the heraldry.

S. S. S.

_William III. at Exeter_ (Vol. iv., p. 233.).--Jenkins, the historian of Exeter, in relating the prince's public entry into that city, states that he was preceded by the Earl of Macclesfield and two hundred horsemen, _most of whom_ were English nobles and gentlemen. There is in the Bodleian Library a fo. broadsheet entitled, _A True and Exact Relation of the Prince of Orange, his Publick Entrance into Exeter_, which, if I remember right, was reprinted in Somers' _Tracts_, but I do not think any names of those gentlemen are therein mentioned.

S. S. S.

_Passage in George Herbert_ (Vol. iv., p. 231.).--Does not Herbert imply in these lines--

"Take one from ten, and what remains?
Ten still, if sermons go for gains."

that the payer of _tithes_ receives an equivalent in the ministrations of the priest?

S. C. C.

Corfe Castle.

This passage alludes doubtless to the tithe of the parson, and maintains that the tithe-payer is no loser if the sermons for which tithe is paid produce their effects. In fact, it is a paraphrase of _Proverbs_, iii. 9, 10.:

"Honour the Lord with all thy substance, and with the first
fruits of all thine increase: so shall thy barns be filled with
plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine."

J. A. PICTON.

Liverpool.

_Suicides buried in Cross Roads_ (Vol. iv., pp. 116. 212.).--This was formerly the general practice in the South of England, and it has occasionally been resorted to within the last thirty years. At Chalvington, in Sussex, there once resided, according to a popular tradition, the _only honest miller ever known_. About a century since, this person, finding it impossible to succeed in business, hanged himself in his own mill, and was buried in a neighbouring "crossways." An oaken stake, driven through his body, taking root, grew into a tree, and threw a singular shrivelled branch, the only one it ever produced, across the road. It was the most singular tree I ever saw, and had something extremely hag-like and ghostly in its look. The spot was of course haunted, and many a rustic received a severe shock to his feelings on passing it after nightfall. The tradition was of course received by the intelligent as a piece of superstitious _folk-lore_, and the story of the "only honest miller" was regarded as a mere _myth_, until about twenty-five years ago, when a labourer employed in digging sand near the roots of the scraggy oak tree, discovered a human skeleton. This part of the history I can vouch for, having seen, when a schoolboy, some of the bones. I must not omit to mention that the honest miller of Chalvington owned the remarkable peculiarity of a "tot" or tuft of hair growing in the palm of each hand!

MARK ANTONY LOWER.

_Armorial Bearings_ (Vol. iv., p. 58.).--The coat of arms described by F. I. B. is given by Robson and by Burke to the family of Kelley of Terrington, co. Devon, and the crests are similar, but I can find no authority for the coat in any work relating to that county. The ancient family, Kelly of Kelly, in Devon, bore a very different coat and crest. There is no such place as Terrington in that county, unless Torrington be meant, but no family of note bearing the name of Kelley had possessions there. I conclude, therefore, that there must be a mistake as to the county.

S. S. S.

"_Life of Cromwell_" (Vol. iv., p. 117.).--No life of Cromwell was ever written by "_one Kember_;" there is a _Life of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland_, the second edition (London, 1725) of which, greatly enlarged from the first, is now before me, and which has the autograph of Malone, who has on the fly-leaf asserted it to have been "written by Isaac Kimber, a Dissenting minister, who was born at Vantage in Berkshire, Dec. 1, 1692. His son, Edward Kimber, refers to it as the work of his father, in a history of England in ten volumes, which he published."

Kimber's life is a much better one than Carlyle's; but the best biography of that most extraordinary man is by Thomas Cromwell, published some twenty or thirty years since, and of which there was a second edition.

J. MT.

_Harris, Painter in Water Colours_ (Vol. iii., p. 329.).--In answer to the inquiry of T. C. W., relative to a Bible (Reeves, 1802) in the possession of his friend, I beg leave to state that the said Bible was illustrated with original drawings by my father, J. Harris of Walworth, who died seventeen years since, and that I am his only son surviving him in his profession. Any further communication relative to him I shall be most happy to give on a personal interview.

J. HARRIS.

40. Sidmouth Street. Regent Square, Sept. 27. 1851.

"_Son of the Morning_" (Vol. iv., p. 209.).--AN OLD BENGAL CIVILIAN is informed that, no matter whom Byron may have intended to designate by the above glorious appellation, there is but ONE to whom it properly belongs. If your correspondent will consult the 110th Psalm, he will find David representing God the Father as thus addressing God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ: "The dew of Thy birth is of the _womb of the morning_."

G. L. S.

Pemb. Coll. Oxon., Sept. 20. 1851.

This seems to be an invocation to the personification of Light, Lucifer, or [Greek: phôsphoros], the "son of the morning," by which intellectual light is indicated, through whose assistance we are enabled to discover the true faith.

The poet enters a caveat that the latter do not act the part of an Iconoclast, as has too often been her wont. At least this appears to me to be the interpretation.

E. I. U. S. Club.

_Grimsdyke or Grimesditch_ (Vol. iv., p. 192.).--Your Querist NAUTICUS describes the vallum or ditch called "Grimsdyke, or Grimesditch, or the Devil's Ditch," running from Great Berkhampstead, Hants, to Bradenham, Bucks, and then puts two Queries.

NAUTICUS assumes that this ditch had, at some distant day, been an artificial earthwork; but at the same time he points out that, "from its total want of flank defence, it could hardly hold an enemy in check for long; and that it does not seem to have been a military way." He asks, "Are there other earthworks of the same name (Grimsdyke) in England?" I find no trace of any other _earthworks_ of that name in England; and it may be very questionable whether this ditch be of ancient earthwork, or of its original natural formation.

But there is, in _Cheshire_, a brook or rivulet in its pristine state, called _Grimsditch_. This brook or rivulet is one of the contributory streams of Cheshire to the great rivers, the Mersey and the Weaver; and is described by the author of _King's Vale Royal of England, or the County Palatine of Chester illustrated_, published in 1656, as follows:

"The Grimsditch cometh from the Hall of Grimsditch, by Preston,
Daresbury, Keckwith, and so falleth into the Marsey."

Here then we have the name of a place which gives the name of _Grimsditch_ to the brook or rivulet; and it is, moreover, shown by the County History that the place (the hamlet or lands of Grimsditch) has been in the possession of a family of the name of Grimsditch from the time of Henry III.

From the words of the original grant this hamlet, by which Thomas Tuschet, in 10 Hen. III. 1226, grants to Hugo de Grimsditch "totam terram de Grimsdich pertinentem ad villam de Witeleigh" (Ormerod's _Chesh._ i. 488.), it may be inferred that the place went by the name of Grimsditch prior to the Norman Conquest. There can therefore be but little doubt that the name is of Anglo-Saxon origin.

The present possessor of the property is Thomas Grimsditch, Esq., late M.P. for the borough of Macclesfield.

The second Query of NAUTICUS applies to the _etymology_ of the word Grimsditch.

This is a very difficult question to solve. Take the first syllable: _Grim_, _grime_, dirt, sullying blackness.

"She sweats; a man may go over shoes in the _grime_ of
it."--Shakspeare.

Then the word _ditch_: this is derived from dic (Saxon), dük (Erse); but whatever may be the true etymology of the word, it can scarcely be doubted that it is of Anglo-Saxon origin.

I may however add that there is a tradition in the Grimsditch family of Cheshire, said to have been handed down for many ages, as to the origin of the name, to the following effect:

That in remote ages their first parents were warriors; that one of these warriors was attacked by a griffin; that a fierce contest ensued; and that the man was the conqueror of that fabulous bird or beast, the battle-ground being a _dyke_ or _ditch_.

Hence, says the tradition, emanated the family coat of arms, which are certainly very singular, viz. Azure, a griffin or, about to tear, and ramping upon, a warrior, completely armed in plate armour, in bend dexter, across the lower part of the shield. Crest, a _Talbot_.

WILLIAM BEAUMONT.

In reply to your correspondent NAUTICUS, who inquires whether there are any ancient entrenchments in England known by the name of _Grimsdyke_, besides the one he mentions in Hants, I beg to remind him that the Roman wall (or ditch and rampart) executed between the Firths of Forth and Clyde during the reign of the Emperor Antoninus Pius, is popularly called by the above name. To account for the name, it has been said that it originated in the circumstance of a chieftain of the name of _Graham_ having been the first to force his way through it; but those who gave such a derivation of the word could scarcely have been aware that it bears this name in common with at least two others, viz., that mentioned by NAUTICUS as existing at Great Berkhampstead, Hants; and the other pointed out by W. S. G. as near Salisbury.