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JOHN NICHOLSON: "MAPS."

(2nd S. iii. 107, 198; 3rd S. iv. 170.) There is not a more valued correspondent of "N. & Q." than MR. DE MORGAN. Whatever proceeds from his pen carries with it an air of conclusive authority on the ground that ipse dixit. It is extremely disappointing, then, to find the PROFESSOR Committing himself to statements so erroneous as those (antè p. 170) relating to the person whose name is at the head of this article; more particularly when, setting himself to correct the errors of others, he himself falls into greater on the same subject.

In giving an authentic history of "Mappesiani Bibliopolii Custos," as he was fond of designating himself, the allusion to him by the "Brace of Cantabs" may be passed by as undeserving notice. Let us then come to Gunning. MR. DE MORGAN justly remarks that Gunning's book "is not a high authority on facts of recollection," still, on the present subject, when he speaks of things within the sphere of his own knowledge, his account is mainly correct. He was resident in the University ten years before the death of Nicholson, and acknowledges to having had the advantage of his library; he must therefore have had a personal knowledge of him. But when he speaks of Nicholson's exhibiting his books "on a small moveable stall," he is drawing upon his imagination; for he states that when he came to college, Nicholson was living in "a large and commodious house belonging to King's College." In fact he never kept a book-stall. Gunning says that the son of "Maps " discovered that he was entitled to the name of Nicholson. MR. DE MORGAN correctly remarks upon this that his name was not lost during his life. But the observation of the facetious Bedell, which seems to imply the contrary, is merely a Gunningism which every one who knew him will know how to appreciate. Gunning's account of the manner in which the portrait of "Maps" came to be placed in the University library is correct. But MR. DE MORGAN says that Nicholson "was an officer of the Public Library all his life." There is not a shadow of truth in this statement; he was never in any way connected with the University library. Nay, I am informed by the library authorities that such an office as MR. DE MORGAN describes never existed except in the imagination of that gentleman. MR. DE MORGAN has travelled out of his brief to describe the worthy old bookseller as "very illiterate," so much so that "he thought that all large folios were books of maps!" Was anything ever more absurd? MR. DE MORGAN remarks upon 66 the inaccuracies incident to reminiscences without memoranda," but how much

greater the inaccuracy that rests upon neither reminiscences nor memoranda. I do not mean to assert that Nicholson was an educated man in the academical sense of the word, but he had received the education usual with "men of business," and is known to have been intelligent and well informed, as his success sufficiently corroborates.*

It is not generally known that Nicholson was not the original "Maps." The first who rejoiced in that sobriquet in Cambridge was Robert Watts, who established the first circulating library in the University about the year 1745.† He died Jan. 31, 1751-2, and left his stock of books, maps, and prints to his only daughter Anne. She, on March 28, 1752, was married to John Nicholson, who thus succeeded to the circulating library, and the sobriquet of his father-in-law, both of which he maintained, with what success is well known, till his death in 1796.

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Nicholson was a native of Mountsorrel, Leicestershire, where his ancestors for some generations had occupied a small farm. He was born in 1730, and was therefore only twenty-two years of age when he married Miss Watts. He had one brother in trade (I am not able to say what) in Leicester; and another settled at Wisbeach in the Isle of Ely as a bookseller, whom my informant, who knew him well, describes as having been a man of considerable intelligence. John Nicholson died Aug. 8, 1796, aged sixty-six. A notice of him will be found in the obituary of the Gent. Mag., vol. lxvi. ii. p. 708, where he is spoken of as cerely lamented by an unparalleled circle of friends, after unremitting attention to business for forty-five years." He is there said to have himself "presented to the University a whole-length portrait of himself [painted by Reinagle] which hangs on the staircase of the Public Library, and under it a print engraven from it [by Caldwall].” The lettering of this print describes it as having been published at the request of " the Vice-Chancellor, Masters, Fellows, Scholars, and Students of the University," to whom it is dedicated. The profits of the sale were to be given to Addenbrooke's Hospital. I may add that he was a man of a most benevolent disposition; and the number of the poorer students of the University was by no means small whom he allowed the gratuitous use of his library. He was also passionately fond of music, and to please him his only daughter, who died at the age of seventeen, had learned to play the violin! Whether that was her only instrument I am not able to say. His widow (Watts's daughter) died Feb. 7, 1814, aged eighty-four. His only surviving son, John, succeeded him in the business, which continued to be carried on in

lated in business not less than 50,000, the larger pro

I am able to state that himself and his son accumuportion of which is believed to have been made by himself. + See Bowtell's MSS. in Downing College library.

the old house in front of King's College till the year 1807 (not, as Gunning says, till the new buildings at King's were commenced, which was in 1824), when it was removed to the corner of Trinity and St. Mary's Streets. John, the second, retired from the business about the year 1821, to Stoke Newington (where he died April 25, 1825), and was succeeded by his elder son John, the third of that name.

This last-mentioned was a man of no mean literary taste and attainments. He was the author of Patus and Arria,* a tragedy in five acts. To which is prefixed a letter to Thomas Sheridan, Esq., on the present state of the English stage, published 1809, by Lackington & Co.; also of Wright and Wrong, a comedy published by the same firm in 1812. He died unmarried Dec. 6, 1822, in the fortieth year of his age; shortly after which time the bookselling business, after having been carried on by the Nicholson family for seventy years, was purchased and continued by Mr. Thomas Stevenson, and more recently by the Messrs. Macmillan.

In the Greek hexameter, MR. DE MORGAN is certainly right in reading col, and not véoi, and for the reason he assigns. The following translation, perhaps contemporary with the original, confirms this:

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In the old churchyard of St. Edward, Cambridge, are inscriptions commemorating Robert Watts, Jan. 31, 1751-2, aged fifty-six; John Nicholson, Aug. 8, 1796, aged sixty-six; Anne his wife, Feb. 7, 1814, aged eighty-four; and John Nicholson, Dec. 3, 1822, aged forty-one. The following note, with reference to these inscriptions, occurs in the 35th part of the Memorials of Cambridge, now on the eve of publication:

"Robert Watts, who dwelt and had a book shop on the western side of Trumpington Street in this parish, was the first person who established a circulating library in Cambridge. It was opened about 1745, and comprised a large stock of standard mathematical and classical books. He dealt also in maps and prints, and acquired the name of Maps. His stock in trade he bequeathed to his only daughter Anne, who, on 28 March, 1752, married John Nicholson of Mountsorrel, Leicestershire, who carried on the business on the same premises with great success till his death in 1796. He was also well known by the name of Maps; and his portrait, by Reinagle (which has been engraved), is in the University library. He was succeeded by his son John, who, in 1807, removed the business to a newly erected house at the corner of Trinity Street and St. Mary's Street. Having accumulated a fortune, he went to reside at Stoke Newington, and gave up the business to his son John, the author of two or more published dramas. Shortly after the death of the latter, which occurred in 1822, the business was disposed of to Mr. Thomas Stevenson, alderman, and sometime mayor, a person of much

* See "N. & Q." 1st S. vol. viii. pp. 219, 374.

literary ability. He discontinued the circulating library On his death, in 1845, the business was sold to Messrs. A. & D. Macmillan, the survivor of whom is an extensive publisher here, and at London and Oxford, under the designation of Macmillan & Co. The second John Nicholson died at Stoke Newington, 25 April, 1825, aged 70.”— Memorials of Cambridge, iii. 279.

For much of the information contained in this note I am indebted to the Rev. Edward Ventris, M.A.

PROFESSOR DE MORGAN has, I think, been egregiously imposed upon with respect to the elder John Nicholson having held an office in the University Library. Having made much inquiry on the subject, I believe I may venture to assert that there never was in the University of Cambridge a porter or beadle, whose duty it was to carry books to those Masters of Arts who wanted them. I think it clear that he did not (as Mr. Gunning asserts and the PROFESSOR surmises) begin by keeping a stall, and that he did not originate the plan of supplying undergraduates with their class books by subscription.

I want proof that he was very illiterate, and thought that all large folios were books of maps. C. H. COOPER. Cambridge.

JACK THE GIANT KILLER.
(3rd S. iv. 306.)

The oldest printed copy of this popular story that I have ever seen, gave Aldermary Churchyard as its place of publication; and from the type, paper, general arrangement, and that something which bespeaks the age without giving a date, I should say it was issued from 1730 to 1740. The title was The History of Jack and the Giants, and the tiny vol. of 16 pp. was in two parts or "books."

Merry Books," "Double Books," and "Histories In Will. Thackeray's broadsheet list of " Small preserved amongst the Bagford papers in the British Museum, no mention is made of Jack and the Giants, although it is a very full gathering of the titles (some 500 in all) of the chapmen's literature of the time. I am inclined to think that this, Jack and the Bean Stalk, and other kindred stories, have only appeared in print during the past 100 or 120 years, although for ages previous to this they existed in the mouths of the people, and were handed down by the old to the young. Towards the middle of the last century, when chapbookselling was at its zenith, and London Bridge, Little Britain, Aldermary, and Bow Churchyards, Gracious or Gracechurch Street, and the lanes running out of Smithfield swarmed with rival chap- (or cheap) booksellers, competition in the production of popular literature must have been very great; and it seems probable that the more

enterprising dealers, anxious for novelties, seized upon the ancient oral tales, and printed them for the first time. The most popular nursery books of the present day are these later printings, whilst The King and the Tanner, The Friar and the Boy, King Arthur's Book, Bevis of Hampton, Elynour Rumming, and scores of others, well known in Shakspeare's time and long afterwards, are no longer in demand amongst the juniors, and are only to be met with in the libraries of the curious. It was Sir Francis Palgrave's opinion that Jack and the Bean Stalk came from the East through Southern Europe, but that Jack the Giant Killer, or, giving it the old title, Jack and the Giants, was one of the popular stories founded upon King Arthur and his exploits. Certain features in the latter story, however, may be observed in the popular tales of Asia.

The wood engravings in Mr. Dunkin's Archæological Mine are of the date stated by the editor, "not a century earlier than Pocock's day." In the very curious volume of old woodcuts recently published at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, D. will see that even in Bewick's time some of the most barbarous wood-blocks ever produced were being turned forth by local engravers. I purchased Catnach and Tommy Pitt's collection of woodblocks, and amongst them are many as rude, and not nearly so well drawn, as those to be met with in the block-books of the fifteenth century.

Piccadilly, W,

JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN.

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"If a visitor should remain in the city during the evening, he may hear the sounding of the Mayor's horn, one of the most ancient customs that lingers in the kingdom. It formerly announced the setting of the watch, whence the chief officer of the town derived his Saxon style of "Wakeman," but has, of course, now lapsed into a formality. Three blasts, long, dull, and dire, are given at nine o'clock, at the Mayor's door, by his official Hornblower, and one afterwards at the Market-cross, while the seventh bell of the Cathedral is ringing. It was ordained in 1598 that it should be blown, according to ancient custom, at the four corners of the cross, at nine o'clock; after which time, if any house on the gate syd within the town' was robbed, the Wakeman was bound to compensate the loss, if it was proved that he and his servants did not their duties at yt time.' To maintain this watch he received from every householder in the town that had but one door, the annual tax of twopence; but from the owner of a gate door, and a backe dore iiij by the year, of dutie.' The original horn, worn by the Wakeman, decorated with silver badges and the insignia of the trading companies of the town, but shamefully pillaged in 1686, has been several times adorned, especially by John Aislabie, Esq., Mayor in 1702; and in 1854. Since the year 1607 it has been worn on certain days by the Serjeant-at-Mace, in procession."

C. W.

CUSTOM AT RIPON.

PAINT AND PATCHES (3rd S. iv. 303.)-Apropos of patches, there is a passage in Fletcher's their use by the male sex : — Elder Brother (1st edition, 1637), describing

your black patches you wear variously. Some cut like stars, some in half-moons, some lozenges."-Elder Brother, iii. 5. For the "early use of paint, we need go to no more recondite source than Hamlet (4to, 1603; the folio misprints "prattlings "): —

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The paragraph quoted by Y. B. N. J. in "N. & Q." (3rd S. iv. 324) "from a north country, newspaper," appeared from my pen in the Standard in August, as part of a report of the visit of the Prince and Princess of Wales to the north. Since the appearance of that report, I have been told by a Riponite that my informant was wrong in attributing the maintenance of the city's charter to the blowing of the horn. However, the horn is undoubtedly blown at nine o'clock every evening; it appears, I think, in the arms of the town, and it is certainly sculptured on one of the pillars of another."-Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 1.

the venerable minster now under slow restoration. My not very courteous correspondent at Ripon did me the favour to send me a shilling Guide to Ripon and the Neighbourhood, bearing the names of Bell & Daldy as its London publishers. From this "Guide" it appears that "Alchfrid, King of Deira, or the southern portion of the kingdom of Northumberland, was lord of the soil, and about the year 660 bestowed on Eata, Abbot of Melrose, a portion of ground at Ripon, whereon to erect a monastic foundation." Alchfrid, on the expulsion of the Scots, gave the monastery to Wilfrid, afterwards Archbishop of York, and

"I have heard of your paintings too, well enough: God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves JOHN ADDIS.

CHIEF BARON EDWARD WILLES: JUDGE EDWARD WILLES (3rd S. i. 487; iv. 318.)- I am much obliged by MR. STEVENS's reference to Beatson's Political Index, where it is noted that the Irish Chief Baron was made, in 1766, Solicitor-General in England, and afterwards a judge of the Court of King's Bench at Westminster. But Beatson is not to be relied upon as an authority, though the statement is repeated in Haydn's edition of Beatson (1851); and in Smyth's Law Officers of Ireland (1839).

The dates of the Chief Baron's resignation, and

of the Solicitor-General's appointment, are no doubt curiously coincident; but, independently of the improbability of a retired chief baron of one country taking an office at the bar of another, all uncertainty is removed by the fact that the Chief Baron died July, 1768 (see Gent. Mag. xxxviii. 349), while the Judge of the King's Bench remained in existence till January, 1787, nearly twenty years after. The Irish Chief Baron, I am informed, was considered to have been the head of the family, of which Chief Justice Willes and his son Edward, the Judge, belonged to a junior EDWARD Foss.

branch.

SEPTUAGINT (3rd S. iv. 307.)-According to Eichhorn (Einleitung, s. 178) the Greek communities of Palestine canonized the hexaplarian recension of the Alexandrine version, those of Egypt, the recension of Hesychius, and those which extend from Antioch to Constantinople, the recension of Lucian. To this I may add, that such of the Greeks as have admitted the supremacy of the Bishop of Rome, would be bound by the edition of Sixtus V. A.D. 1587. T. J. BUCKTON.

Papa and Mamma (3rd S. iv. 306.)—It is not correct to say that we derive these words from the Greek; but it may be safely stated that we, as well as the Greeks, derived them from a common source. What that source is cannot be certainly affirmed in the present state of comparative philology; but we have in Sanscrit pitar, "father," and papus, "nourisher," as derivative from the verb på, "to nourish, to support;" also in Sanscrit mátar, "mother," a derivative of the verb má, "to expand, to measure." The usual practice, and not etymology, determines the mode of spelling. T. J. BUCKTON.

EGLANTINE (3rd S. iv. 305.)-Milton's error in giving this name to the honeysuckle instead of the sweetbriar-rose, is pointed out in the Penny Cyclopædia (art. "Eglantine.") In French eglantine is the wild rose; aiglantier and eglantier, mean sweetbriar; in English hep-tree, and in German hagebuttenstrauch mean the wild or dog-rose as well as sweetbriar. Sir Walter Scott appears also to be in error, according to Anne Pratt (Flowers and their Associations, p. 131), in applying the name eglantine "to that luxuriant creeper the traveller's joy, or wild clematis, or virgin's bower, which is commonly, though erroneously, termed eglantine." She says, "the true eglantine of the older writers is, however, the prickly sweetbriar, which so often forms a hedge for our gardens, pouring upon the breeze the delicious odour that resides in the herbage as much as in the blosIt is the Rosa rubiginosa of modern botanists, and the Rosa eglanteria of the olden time." It is to this Shakspeare refers:

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"And leaf of eglantine, whom, not to slander, Outsweeten'd not thy breath."

Spenser and Shakspeare call the honeysuckle (our woodbine) caprifole. It is still named by botanists caprifolium. Drummond, following the French, means by eglantine, the wild rose: so does Walter Scott, perhaps. T. J. BUCKTON.

(Rosa rubiginosa.) Its derivation from the French The eglantine is undoubtedly the sweetbriar Milton spoke of the "twisted eglantine," he no word aiglantier proves this beyond dispute. When doubt meant the honeysuckle; but poets are not always botanists, and the probability is that he made a mistake, and confounded one plant with another. I think we should search in vain for any period when the word eglantine was first used for the honeysuckle; for I cannot consider that it ever was so used, except from an imperfect acquaintance with botanical names, which is very common, and very excusable. I am inclined to think that Wither, in the lines, quoted, falls into a similar confusion by speaking of the woodbine, when he in reality means the bindweed. He calls the woodbine fair, an epithet very appropriate to the bindweed with its snow-white flowers, but not at all to the honeysuckle. The "sharp-scent would apply equally to the sweetbriar and honeysuckle. F. C. H.

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DERIVATION OF PAMPHLET (3rd S. iv. 315.) — I am decidedly in favour of the derivation from par un filet. It is very unlikely that recourse was had to the Greek for the composition of such a word; and attempts to trace familiar names in our language to learned sources always reminds me of Porson's immortal derivation of pancake from wâv kakóv, because that dish had disagreed with him. A French abbé, many years ago, told me that the word pamphlet was derived from par un filet. He was a shrewd well-educated man, and he said this as a matter of course, and without any idea that any other derivation was even dreamt of. What after all was more natural than

for a few leaves stitched together by a thread to be called par un filet, or for those three words to subside into the English word pamphlet?_ F. C. H.

Dr. Ash, in his Dictionary, 8vo, 1775, gives the following:

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Pamphlet, s. from the French pas, without, and filet, a band, a small book unbound." J. W.

Let me tell BIBLIOTHECAR. CHETHAM. that

pamphlet was spelled by Caxton paunflet, and in that form was supposed to be derived from the Latin pagina filata. JUVENIS.

FRANCIS BURLEIGH (3rd S. iv. 228, 314) was matriculated as a sizar of Catharine Hall in March, 1578-9, but subsequently migrated to Pembroke Hall, where he was one of Dr. Watts's Greek

scholars, proceeding B.A. as a member of the latter house, 1582-3, and commencing M.A. 1587. He was created D.D. 1607, and became one of the Fellows of Chelsea College May 8, 1610.

Dr. Andrew Byng died at Winterton in Norfolk, in March, 1651-2. He was a native of Cambridge, and there is a memoir of him in Cooper's Annals of Cambridge, iii. 448. About 1605 there was a decree of the Chapter of York to keep a residentiary's place for Andrew Byng, as he was then occupied in translating the Bible. (Drake's Eboracum, App. p. lxxvii.)

Francis Dillingham matriculated as a pensioner of Christ's College in June 1583; became B.A. 1586-7, was elected a Fellow, and in 1590 commenced M.A.; he proceeded B.D. 1599. He died unmarried, but at what time we have not ascertained. It is probable that the registers of Dean or Wilden may supply the information. As to him see Fuller's Worthies, ed. 1840, i. 170. We have the titles of eight theological works published by him from 1599 to 1606.

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Thomas Harrison. -This learned and estimable person was Vice-Master (not Master) of Trinity College. He died in July 1631, and was buried in the college chapel. As to him see Harrison Honoratus by Caleb Dalechamp, Camb. 8vo. 1632; and Duport's Musa Subsecivæ, 497.

Geoffrey King, elected from Eton to King's College in 1583, was Regius Professor of Hebrew (1607), vicar of Lancaster, and chaplain to Archbishop Bancroft. His name occurs in the Commission for Causes Ecclesiastical within the Province of York, issued July 1, 1625. We hope the inquiries of X. Y. Z., with the little information we are enabled to give respecting him, may elicit

the date of his death.

Dates (3rd S. iv. 248, 300, &c.) — Sandford, in his Genealogical History, p. 81, speaks of the betrothal of John Lackland to Alice of Maurienne as having taken place in the month of February, 1173. I suppose that, according to modern computation, this would be February, 1174.

The death of William Earl of Gloucester has been rightly assigned by two of your correspondents to the year 1183. The date 1173 is to be found in Dugdale's Baronage, vol. i. 536. But it is evident from the context that this was merely an error of the press. MELETES.

SIR ROGER WILBRAHAM (2nd S. xii. 70, 138.)The following particulars in reference to this Cheshire worthy are at the service of the MESSES. COOPER. Sir Roger Wilbraham of Bridgmore was born in or about 1553, as he was in his fiftieth year when his portrait, still existing at Delamere House in this county, was painted in 1602. He was admitted of Gray's Inn in 1586.

The following memorandum under his father's hand gives the date of his appointment as Irish Solicitor-General:

"That Roger Wilbraham, my son, being appointed her Maties Solvcitor general for the realme of Ireland, the viijth of Februarie, 1585, did take his jorney towards the same realme from Namptwiche the iij of March, 1585, and in the xxviijth year of the reigne of our most gracious ladye Queene Elizabeth, whom I beseeche God longe to p'serve in helth, welth, joy and felycitie, and prosper and blesse hym in this her Maties servyce. Amen."

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The same authority goes on to say :

Upon the ascension of or Lorde, being the firste day of Maye, 1600, and in the xiijth year of her Matic, it pleased her grace to bestow upon my son Roger Wilbraham the offyce to be one of the Maysters of Requestes. God p'serve her highness, and give him grace for to serve hym and her Matic to God his glory and her lykyng. Amen." Edward Lively was buried at St. Edward's in.. "My sayd son was maryede in Januarie last past before Cambridge, May 7, 1605. See a memoir of him the date heroff in a° 1599.” . "Marie Wilbrahain, in Athen. Cantabr. ii. 407, 554. daughter of my sayd son Roger Wilbraham, was borne at 1600, A Regina Elizabeth xiij." Sainte John's in Smythfylde the seventh day of October,

Michael Rabbett was of Trinity College, Cambridge, whereto he was elected from Westminster School in 1571. He held the vicarage of Streatham, in Surrey, for forty-six years, and died February 5, 1630-1, aged seventy-eight. He was also rector of St. Vedast, Foster Lane, London, from 1603 to 1617.

Robert Spalding.—A brief account of him will be found in Athen. Cantabr. ii. 479. We have not met with anything which induces us to doubt the accuracy of our supposition that he died in 1607, when his office of Regius Professor of Hebrew be

came vacant.

Richard Thompson. - This very learned man (commonly called Dutch Thompson) was Fellow of Clare Hall, and was presented by Bishop Andrewes to the rectory of Snailwell in Cambridgeshire. He was buried at St. Edward's, Cambridge, Jan. 8, 1612-13. C. H. & THOMPSON COOPER. Cambridge.

A pedigree of Randle Holme's names his daughter Katherine as the wife of Sir Thomas Delves, but this is manifestly an error. Sir Thomas married the mother, and Sir Henry (his son) the daughter, as is clearly set forth in the pedigree still extant in the College of Arms.

The date of Sir Roger's death is variously stated,. the MESSES. COOPER giving it as July 19, 1616. The portrait already referred to has inscribed thereon, "obiit xii Julii, 1610;" but there exists at Delamere House a MS. note by Mr. Thomas Wilbraham (nephew of Sir Roger) to the effect that "Sir Roger Wilbraham, my uncle, one of the Masters of Requests, and Survayor of the Court of Wards, died the last of July, 1616."

The MESSRS. COOPER will know better than I do whether Sir Roger published any legal or other works; but, I may add, that there is at Delamere

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