Notes and Queries, Number 203, September 17, 1853

Any reader who will take a quantity of disputed passages in Shakspeare, and happens to be ignorant of what has been suggested by others, will discover that, in most of the cases, if he merely tries his skill on a few simple permutations of the letters, he will in one way or another stumble on the suggested words. Let us take, for example, what may be considered in its way as one of the most incomprehensible lines in Shakspeare—"Will you go, An-heires?" the last word being printed with a capital. Running down with the vowels from a, we get at once an apparently plausible suggestion, "Will you go on here?" but a little consideration will show how extremely unlikely this is to be the genuine reading, and that Mr. Dyce is correct in preferring Mynheers—a suggestion which belongs to Theobald, and not, as he mentions, to Hanmer. But what I maintain is, that on here would be the correction that would occur to most readers, in all probability to be at once dismissed. Mr. Collier, however, says "it is singular that nobody seems ever to have conjectured that on here might be concealed under An-heires;" and it would have been singular had this been the case, but the suggestion of on here is to be found in Theobald's common edition. Oddly enough, about a year before Mr. Collier's volume appeared, it was again suggested as if it were new.

Let us select a still more palpable instance (Measure for Measure, Act II. Sc. 1.): "If this law hold in Vienna ten years, I'll rent the fairest house in it after threepence a bay." If this reading be wrong, which I do not admit, the second change in the first letter creates an obvious alteration, day, making at least some sort of sense, if not the correct one. Some years ago, I was rash enough to suggest day, not then observing the alteration was to be found in Pope's edition, and Mr. Collier has fallen into the same oversight, when he gives it as one of the corrector's new emendations. I regard these oversights as very pardonable, and inseparable from any extensive attempt to correct the state of the text. All Shakspearian conjectures either anticipate or are anticipated.

Mr. Dyce being par excellence the most judicious verbal critic of the day, it will scarcely be thought egotistical to claim for myself the priority for one of his emendations—"Avoid thee, friend," in the Few Notes, p. 31., a reading I had mentioned in print before the appearance of that work. This is merely one of the many evidences that all verbal conjecturers must often stumble on the same suggestions. Even the MS. corrector's alteration of the passage is not new, it being found in Pope's and in several other editions of the last century; another circumstance that exhibits the great difficulty and danger of asserting a conjecture to be absolutely unknown.

J. O. Halliwell

P.S. The subject is, of course, capable of almost indefinite extension, but the above hasty notes will probably occupy as much space as you would be willing to spare for its consideration.

Alcides' Shoes.—There is merit, in my opinion, in elucidating, if it were only a single word in our great dramatist. Even the attempt, though mayhap a failure, is laudable. I therefore have made, and shall make, hit or miss, some efforts that way. For example, I now grapple with that very odd line—

"As great Alcides' shoes upon an ass."—King John, Act II. Sc. 1.

out of which no one has as yet extracted, or I think ever will extract, any good meaning: Argal, it is corrupt. Now it appears to me that the critic who proposed to read shows, came very near the truth, and would have hit it completely if he had retained Alcides', for it is the genitive with robe understood. To explain:

Austria has on him the "skin-coat" of Cœur-de-Lion, and Blanch cries,—

"O! well did he become that lion's robe,That did disrobe the lion of that robe."

"It lies," observes the Bastard,

"It lies as sightly on the back of him (Austria)As great Alcides' (robe) shows upon an ass:—But, ass, I'll take that burden from your back," &c.

Were it not that doth is the usual word in this play, I might be tempted to read does. In reading or acting, then, the cæsura should be made at Alcides', with a slight pause to give the hearer time to supply robe. I need not say that the robe is the lion's skin, and that there is an allusion to the fable of the ass.

Now to justify this reading. Our ancestors knew nothing of our mode of making genitives by turned commas. They formed the gen. sing., and nom. and gen. pl., by simply adding s to the nom. sing.; thus king made kings, kings, kings (not king's, kings, kings'), and the context gave the case. If the noun ended in se, ce, she, or che, the addition of s added a syllable, as horses, princes, &c., but it was not always added. Shakspeare, for example, uses Lucrece and cockatrice as genitives. I find the first instances of such words as James's, &c., about the middle of the seventeenth century, but I am not deeply read in old books, so it may have been used earlier.

In foreign words like Alcides, no change ever took place; it was the same for all numbers and cases, and the explanation was left to the context. Here are a couple of examples from Shakspeare himself:

"My fortunes every way as fairly ranked—If not with vantage—as Demetrius."—Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I. Sc. 1.

"To Brutus, to Cassius. Burn all. Some to Decius house, and some to Cascas; some to Ligarius. Away! go!"—Julius Cæsar, Act III. Sc. 3.

All here are genitives, as well as Cascas. If any doubt, Brutus and Cassius, we have just been told, "Are rid like madmen through the gates of Rome," so they could not be burned. I say now, judicet lector!

I must not neglect to add that there was another mode of forming the genitive, namely, by the possessive pronoun, as the king his palace. "A fly that flew into my mistress her eye," is the title of one of Carew's poems.

Thos. Keightley.

Minor Notes

Longfellow's Poetical Works.—One of the best printed editions of Longfellow's Poetical Works which has appeared in England is ushered in by "An Introductory Essay" by the Rev. G. Gilfillan, A.M. I had lived in hopes, through each successive edition, that either the good taste of the publishers would strike out the preface entirely, or the amended taste of its author curtail some of its redundancies. As neither has been the case, but the 4th edition of the book now lies before me, I beg to offer the following examples:

1. Of Ancient History:

"His [Longfellow's] ornaments, unlike those of the Sabine maid, have not crushed him."

2. Of Modern History—Dickens a Poet:

"A prophet may wrap himself up in austere and mysterious solitude: a poet must come 'eating and drinking.' Thus came Shakspeare, Dryden, Burns, Scott, Göthe; and thus have come in our day, Dickens, Hood, and Longfellow."

Is the song of "The Ivy Green" in Pickwick sufficient to justify this appellation? I do not remember any other "Poem" by Charles Dickens.

3. Of Metaphors. Out of sixteen pages it is difficult to make a selection, but the following are striking:

"If not a prophet, torn by a secret burden, and uttering it in wild tumultuous strains,… he has found inspiration … in the legends of other lands, whose native vein, in itself exquisite, has been highly cultivated and delicately cherished."

"Excelsion," we are told, "is one of those happy thoughts which seem to drop down, like fine days, from some serener region, or like moultings of the celestial dove, which meet instantly the ideal of all minds, and run on afterwards, and for ever, in the current of the human heart."

Does not this almost come up to Lord Castlereagh's famous metaphor? It certainly goes beyond Mr. Gilfillan's own praise of Longfellow, whose sentiment is described as "never false, nor strained, nor mawkish. It is always mild,… and sometimes it approaches the sublime." Mr. G. goes one step farther.

W. W.

Northamptonshire.

Sir Walter Raleigh.—I find the following remonstrance in defence of this distinguished man, against the imputation of Hume, in a letter addressed by Dr. Parr to Charles Butler:

"Why do you follow Hume in representing Raleigh as an infidel? For Heaven's sake, dear Sir, look to his preface to his History of the World; look at his Letters, in a little 18mo., and here, but here only, you will find a tract [entitled The Sceptic], which led Hume to talk of Raleigh as an unbeliever. It is an epitome of the principles of the old sceptics; and to me, who, like Dr. Clarke and Mr. Hume, am a reader of Sextus Empiricus, it is very intelligible. Indeed, Mr. Butler, it is a most ingenious performance. But mark me well: it is a mere lusus ingenii."

Mr. Butler appends this note:

"Mr. Fox assured the Reminiscent, that either he, or Mrs. Fox to him, had read aloud the whole, with a small exception, of Sir Walter Raleigh's History."—Butler's Reminiscences, vol. ii. p. 232.

Balliolensis.

Curious Advertisement.—The following genuine advertisement is copied from a recent number of the Connecticut Courant, published at Hartford in America:

"Julia, my wife, has grown quite rude,She has left me in a lonesome mood;She has left my board,She has took my bed,She has gave away my meat and bread,She has left me in spite of friends and church,She has carried with her all my shirts.Now ye who read this paper,Since she cut this reckless caper,I will not pay one single fractionFor any debts of her contraction.Levi Rockwell.East Windsor, Conn. Aug. 4, 1853."G. M. B.

Gravestone Inscription.—I send an inscription on a gravestone in Northill churchyard, Bedfordshire, which is now nearly obliterated, given me by the Rev. John Taddy:

"Life is a city full of crooked streets,Death is the market-place where all men meets.If life were merchandise which men could buy,The rich would only live, the poor would die."Julia R. Bockett.

Southcote Lodge.

Monumental Inscription.—

"Here lyeth the body of the most noble Elizabeth, daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, own sister to King Henry the Fourth, wife of John Holland, Earl of Huntingdon and Duke of Exeter, after married to Sir John Cornwall, Knight of the Garter, and Lord Fanhope. She died the 4th year of Henry the Sixth, Anno Domini 1426."

The above is on a monument in Burford Church, in the county of Salop, and will perhaps be interesting to your correspondent Mr. Hardy.

Burford Church, in which there are several other interesting monuments, is situated in the luxuriant valley of the Teme, about eight miles south-east of Ludlow.

A Salopian.

Queries

SIR PHILIP WARWICK

"A Discourse of Government, as examined by Reason, Scripture, and the Law of the Land. Written in 1678, small 8vo.: London, 1694."

"Memoirs of the Reign of King Charles I., &c., 8vo.: London, 1702."

To one or the other of these publications there was prefixed a preface which, as giving offence to the government, was suppressed. I agree with Mr. Bindley, who says (writing to Mr. Granger),

"The account you have given in your books of the suppressed preface to Sir Philip Warwick's Memoirs, is an anecdote too curious not to make one wish it authenticated."—Letters to Mr. Granger, p. 389.

The statement of Granger is adopted also by the Edinburgh editor of the Memoirs in 1813 (query, Sir W. Scott?), who says in his preface,

"These Memoirs were first published by the learned Dr. Thomas Smith, a nonjuring divine, distinguished by oriental learning, and his writings concerning the Greek Church. The learned editor added a preface so much marked by his political principles, that he was compelled to alter and retrench it, for fear of a prosecution at the instance of the crown."—Preface, p. ix.

So far as concerns the Memoirs. But in a note prefixed to a copy of the Discourse of Government, now in the Bodleian among Malone's books, and in his handwriting, it is stated,—

"This book was published by Dr. Thomas Smith, the learned writer concerning the Greek Church. The preface, not being agreeable to the Court at the time it was published (the 5th year of William III.), was suppressed by authority, but is found in this and a few other copies. Granger says (vol. iv. p. 60., vol. v. p. 267., new edit.) that this preface by Dr. Smith was prefixed to Sir P. W.'s Memoirs of Charles I.; but this is a mistake. Whether Smith was the editor of the Memoirs I know not.—Edmond Malone."

The obnoxious preface is assigned to the Discourse of Government also, by a writer in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1790, p. 509., where is a portrait of Warwick, and a notice of his life.

The Edinburgh editor of the Memoirs gives the original preface of that work, which presents nothing at which exception could be taken. But as my copy of the Discourse is one of the few which (according to Malone) retains the address of "the publisher to the reader," I transcribe the following passages, which perhaps will sufficiently explain the suppression in 1694:

"As to the disciples and followers of Buchanan, Hobbs and Milton, who have exceeded their masters in downright impudence, scurrility, and lying, and the new modellers of commonwealths, who, under a zealous pretence of securing the rights of a fancied original contract against the encroachments of monarchs, are sowing the seeds of eternal disagreements, confusions, and bloody wars throughout the world (for the influence of evil principles hath no bounds, but, like infectious air, spreads everywhere), the peaceable, sober, truly Christian, and Church-of-England doctrine contained in this book, so directly contrary to their furious, mad, unchristian, and fanatical maxims, it cannot otherwise be expected but that they will soon be alarmed, and betake themselves to their usual arts of slander and reviling, and grow very fierce and clamorous upon it. Whatever shall happen," &c.

Subsequently the author is spoken of as

"A gentlemen of sincere piety, of strict morals, of a great and vast understanding, and of a very solid judgement; a true son of the Church of England, and consequently a zealous asserter and defender of the truly Christian and apostolical doctrine of non-resistance; always loyal and faithful to the king his master in the worst of times," &c.

After these specimens, there will be little difficulty, I think, in determining that Granger was mistaken in describing the preface to the Memoirs as that which was suppressed, and that it was the publisher's "address to the reader" of the Discourse which incurred that sentence. Dr. Thomas Smith appears to have edited both works; and in the same address informs us of other works of Warwick in

"Divinity, philosophy, history, especially that of England, practical devotion, and the like. This I now publish [the Discourse] was written in the year 1678 (and designed as an appendix to his Memoirs of the Reign of King Charles the First, of most blessed memory, which hereafter may see the light, when more auspicious times shall encourage and favour the publication), which he, being very exact and curious in his compositions, did often refine upon," &c.

It may be well to inquire whether any of these theological or philosophical lucubrations are yet extant. Was Sir Philip connected at all with Dr. Smith, or was he descended from Arthur Warwick, author of Spare Minutes?

Balliolensis.

SEALS OF THE BOROUGH OF GREAT YARMOUTH

I shall be exceedingly obliged by any explanatory remarks on the following list of seals:—

1. Oval (size 2.1 in. by 1.3). The angel Gabriel kneeling before a standing figure of the Virgin, and holding a scroll, on which is inscribed AVE MARIA. Legend:

*

S. HOS * PITALIS * IER * NE * NACH.

Yarmouth was anciently called Gernemutha, or Iernemutha; and Ives attributes this seal to Yarmouth, though both the legend and the workmanship have a decidedly foreign appearance.

Can any more satisfactory locality be assigned it?

2. Circular (1 in. in diameter). Three fishes naiant (the arms of Yarmouth), within a bordure of six cusps. Legend:

SAAL D' ASAI D' GRANT GARNAMVT.

Workmanship of about the fourteenth century; use unknown; but it has been employed for sealing burgess letters for many years past, until 1847.

Can it have reference to the staple? (Vid. Statutes at Large, Anne; 27 Ed. III. stat. 2.; 43 Ed. III. cap. 1.; 14 Ric. II. cap. 1.)

3. Circular (size 1.1 in. diameter). On an escutcheon a herring hauriant; the only instance of this bearing in connection with Yarmouth. Legend:

S. offic : corrotulat : í : nove : Iernmuth.

Of this seal nothing whatever is known. Its workmanship is of the fifteenth century. The suggested extension of the legend is "Sigillum officii contrarotulatoris"—in nova Jernemutha, or in nave Jernemuthe. But was Yarmouth ever called nova Gernemutha? or what was the office alluded to?

The above are required for a literary purpose; and as speedy an answer as possible would much oblige me.

E. S. Taylor.

Minor Queries

Hand in Bishop Canning's Church.—In Bishop Canning's Church, Wilts, is a curious painting of a hand outstretched, and having on the fingers and thumb several inscriptions in abbreviated Latin. Can any correspondent tell me when and why this was placed in the church; and also the inscriptions which appear thereon?

Russell Gole.

"I put a spoke in his wheel."—What is the meaning of the phrase, "I put a spoke in his wheel?"

In April last, a petition was heard in the Rolls Court on the part of the trustees of Manchester New College, praying that they might be allowed to remove that institution to London; and a single trustee was heard against such removal. One of the friends of the college was on this occasion heard to remark, "the removal to London was going on very smoothly, and it would have been done by this time, if this one trustee had not put his spoke in the wheel:" meaning, that the conscientious scruple of this trustee was the sole impediment to the movement. Is this the customary and proper mode of using the phrase; and, if so, how can putting a spoke to a wheel impede its motion?

On the other hand, having heard some persons say that they had always understood the phrase to denote affording help to an undertaking, and confidently allege that this must be the older and more correct usage, for "what," say they, "is a wheel without spokes?" I inquired of an intelligent lady, of long American descent, in what way she had been accustomed to hear the phrase employed, and the answer was "Certainly as a help: we used to say to one who had anything in hand of difficult accomplishment, 'Do not be faint-hearted, I'll give you a spoke.'"

Dr. Johnson, in the folio edition of his Dictionary, 1755, after defining a spoke to be the "bar of a wheel that passes from the nave to the felly," cites:

"      .       .       .       .       All you gods,In general synod, take away her power,Break all the spokes and fellies to her wheel,And bowl the round nave down the hill of Heaven."—Shakspeare.G. K.

Sir W. Hewit.—At p. 159. of Mr. Thoms's recent edition of Pulleyn's Etymological Compendium, Sir W. Hewit, the father-in-law of Edward Osborne, who was destined to found the ducal family of Leeds, is said to have been "a pin-maker." Some other accounts state that he was a clothworker; others again, that he was a goldsmith. Which is correct; and what is the authority? And where may any pedigree of the Osborne family, previous to Edward, be seen?

H. T. Griffith.

Passage in Virgil.—Dr. Johnson, in his celebrated Letter to Lord Chesterfield, says, in reference to the hollowness of patronage: "The shepherd, in Virgil, grew at last acquainted with Love; and found him a native of the rocks." To what passage in Virgil does Johnson here refer, and what is the point intended to be conveyed?

R. Fitzsimons.

Dublin.

Fauntleroy.—In Binns' Anatomy of Sleep it is stated that a few years ago an affidavit was taken in an English court of justice, to the effect that Fauntleroy was still living in a town of the United States.

Can any of your correspondents refer me to the circumstance in question?

C. Clifton Barry.

Animal Prefixes, descriptive of Size and Quality.—Will somebody oblige me by pointing out in the modern languages any analogous instances to the Greek βον, English horse-radish, dog-rose, bull-finch, &c.?

C. Clifton Barry.

Punning Devices.—Sir John Cullum, in his Hist. of Hawsted, 1st edit. p. 114., says that the seal of Sir William Clopton, knight, t. Hen. VII., was "a ton, out of which issues some plant, perhaps a caltrop, which might be contracted to the first syllable of his name." This appears to be too violent a contraction. Can any of your readers suggest any other or closer analogy between the name and device?

Buriensis.

"Pinece with a stink."—In Archbishop Bramhall's Schism Guarded (written against Serjeant) there is a passage in which the above curious expression occurs, and of which I can find no satisfactory, nor indeed any explanation whatever. The passage is this (Works, vol. ii. p. 545., edit. Ox.):

"But when he is baffled in the cause, he hath a reserve,—that Venerable Bede, and Gildas, and Foxe in his Acts and Monuments, do brand the Britons for wicked men, making them 'as good as Atheists; of which gang if this Dinoth were one,' he 'will neither wish the Pope such friends, nor envy them to the Protestants.'

"What needeth this, when he hath got the worst of the cause, to defend himself like a pinece with a stink? We read no other character of Dinoth, but as of a pious, learned, and prudent man."

Can any of your readers furnish an explanation?

R. Blakiston.

Soiled Parchment Deeds.—Having in my possession some old and very dirty parchment deeds, and other records, now almost illegible from the accumulation of grease, &c., on the surface of the skins, I am desirous to know if there be any "royal road" to the cleansing and restoration of these otherwise enduring MSS.?

T. Hughes.

Chester.

Roger Wilbraham, Esq.'s Cheshire Collection.—Can any of your correspondents say where the original collection made by the above-named gentleman, or a copy of them, referred to in Dr. Foote Gower's Sketch of the Materials for a Cheshire History, may now be met with?

Cestriensis.

Cambridge and Ireland.—In the first volume of the Pictorial History of England, p. 270., it is stated that—

"Martin skins are mentioned in Domesday Book among the commodities brought by sea to Chester; and this appears from other authorities to have been one of the exports in ancient times from Ireland. Notices are also found of merchants from Ireland landing at Cambridge with cloths, and exposing their merchandise to sale."

The authority quoted for this statement is Turner, vol. iii. p. 113.

On referring to Turner's Anglo-Saxons, I find it stated:

"We read of merchants from Ireland landing at Cambridge with cloths, and exposing their merchandise to sale."

Mr. Turner refers to Gale, vol. ii. p. 482.

I do not know to what work Mr. Turner refers, unless to Gale's Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores Veteres; on examining this I can find no passage at the page and volume indicated, on the subject.