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you, ye boundless regions of all perfection!" do
not English Salis's verses, "Ins stille Land!
Zu euch, ihr freien Räume Für die Vered-
Jung!" Nor do the words in the same stanza,
"The Future's pledge and band!" adequately
render the original: “Künft 'gen Daseins Pfand," |
which simply means that the tender morning dreams
of beauteous souls are the "pledge of a future
life."
K. TEN BRUGGENCATE.

"The mildest herald by our fate allotted for all the broken-hearted" (to quote Longfellow's words in their natural order) is Sleep, the Somnus of the ancients. Cf. Ovid, 'Metam.,' xi. 623 :

placidissime Somne deorum,

Pax animi, quem cura fugit.

The reading fate is certainly the original, and "faith," in its stead, a later alteration. For Longfellow's translation, "The mildest herald by our fate allotted beckons" renders the original of Salis: "Der mildeste von unsers Schicksals Boten winkt uns." As an illustration of this "Angel of Death," who stands with inverted torch and leans upon a corpse, to symbolize the extinction of life, it may be worth while to refer to Lessing's dissertation (first printed in 1769), Wie die Alten den Tod gebildet." Oxford.

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H. KREBS.

THE POETS LAUREATE (8th S. ii. 385, 535; iii. 89). Apparently Dr. Furnivall and his coadjutors of the Chaucer Society have not yet succeeded in

To fall asleep is to die, sleep being a figure of extinguishing the belief that Chaucer was born in death :

Stulte, quid est somnus gelidæ nisi mortis imago? In Smith's Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Biogr. and Mythol.,' art. "Somnus," we are told that "in works of art Sleep and Death are represented alike as two youths sleeping or holding inverted torches in their hands." Thus, in a statuary group of Sleep and the Muses from the Cassian villa at Tivoli, Sleep is exhibited as a youth standing, the head reclined, the eyes shut, the left arm resting on a tree-stump and holding with difficulty a torch reversed (Bernard, 'Dictionnaire Mythologique '). The meaning of the inverted torch is obvious, both Sleep and Death being offspring of Night. Homer ('Iliad,' xvi. 672) calls them twins (didvμáoves). The words of Gorgias on his death bed are memorable: "Sleep is already beginning to hand me over to his brother" (Ælian, 'Var. Hist.,' ii. 35).

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In reply to MR. WARREN, I take leave to inform him that "fate" is the vera lectio, being represented in the German original by Schicksal :

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1328. This date is given as that of the poet's birth by MR. WALTER HAMILTON, in his elaborate and useful "Table of the Poets Laureate of England" at the last reference. Nor does MR. HAMILTON indicate that there is any doubt on the subject, just as if nothing had occurred since George L. Craik wrote, fifty years ago, "Chaucer is supposed to have been born......in the year 1328, if we may trust what is said to have heen the ancient inscription on his tombstone." Now, since those remote days, there has been a Chaucer Society, and Dr. Furnivall, Dr. Morris, Prof. Ward, and Prof. Skeat have all laboured to shed new light on the difficulty. See specially Chaucer's 'Prologue,' &c., edited for the Clarendon Press by Dr. Morris and Prof. Skeat. THOMAS BAYNE.

Helensburgh, N.B.

I take the following from Lloyd's Evening Post: reate, in the eighty-sixth year of his age. Dec. 9-12, 1757. Died, Colley Cibber, Esq., Poet Lau

Dec. 12-14. We hear that Mr. Mason, author of 'Elfrida,' is to succeed Colley Cibber, Esq., as Poet Laureate. The salary is 1007, a year, and a handsome allowance for a butt of sack annually.

Dec. 18. On Sunday night was interred, in South Audley Chapel, the remains of Colley Cibber, Esq.

Dec. 19. Monday, William Whitehead, Esq., late of Clare Hall, Camb., was appointed by his Grace the Duke of Devonshire Poet Laureate in the room of Colley Cibber, Esq., deceased.

From this it would appear that Cibber was not buried in the "Danish Church, London," as stated 66 an annual allowby MR. HAMILTON; and that ance in lieu of the wine" was not first made in the case of Henry James Pye.

W. F. WALLER.

"EATING POOR JACK" (8th S. ii. 529; iii. 76). -This is the equivalent of the Spanish phrase "Hacer penitencia." Your Spaniard, when he asks you to dinner, says sometimes, "Comemos a las seis: Quiere vmd. hacer penitencia conmigo?" (We dine at six. Will you come and do penance with me?) Now, "Poor Jack"= Poor John, and Trinculo could tell you who he is. "A fish: Hesmells

like a fish; a very ancient and fish-like smell; a
kind of none of the newest Poor-John." So also
could Gregory: ""Tis well thou art not fish; if
thou hadst, thou hadst been poor John." Now,
Poor John is dried hake or cod (Bacalao).
HENRY H. GIBBS.

Aldenham.

ANDREW VESALIUS (8th S. ii. 527).—In the account of Vesalius which is given in Adams's 'Biographical Dictionary' (1793-5) there occurs the following statement: "He was married, but such the querulous and imperious humour of his wife, that he never enjoyed much happiness at home" (vol. iii. p. 375). J. F. MANSERGH. Liverpool.

There is some account of the life of Vesalius prefixed to his works, published by Boërhave (Leyden, 1725). CONSTANCE RUSSELL.

Swallowfield, Reading.

CHARLES LAMB AS A RITUALIST (8th S. iii. 28, 76).-PALAMEDES' and DR. SIMPSON's quotations refer to "Dicky" Suett, not to Dodd. See Canon Ainger's edition of the Essays of Elia,' 1883, pp. 188, 189. E. S. N.

Is not stole often used by the poets as an equivalent to surplice, in the classical sense of "ad talos stola demissa"? When Scott, for instance, says:

That night alone of all the year, Saw the stoled priest the chalic rear, he meant probably the larger rather than the smaller vestment. I quote the lines from memory. EDWARD H. MARSHALL, M.A.

Hastings.

possible, moreover, that in their minds the word
"stole " had its classical meaning of a long gar-
ment, a use of it, I fancy, not unknown to our
older writers ?
W. C. B.

PARISH EKE-NAMES (8th S. iii. 46).—The following Gloucestershire distich may interest MR. JAMES HOOPER :

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Mincing Hampton and Painswick Proud,
Beggarly Bisley and Strutting Stroud.

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Mincing Hampton " is a mere verbal play on the full name of the village, which is Minchinhampton. Apt alliteration's artful aid " has possibly had quite as much to do with the choice of the other epithets as their inherent appropriateness. Some applicability may, however, perhaps be traced to the localities to which they are respectively prefixed. Bisley is a poor village in an agricultural district, the soil of which is unproductive. Stroud, on the other hand, was formerly surrounded by manufactories, and numbered among its inhabitants many of the nouveaux riches. If pride springs from poverty, the epithet to Painswick may have been well chosen, as it has been said that the inhabitants of that village are in an unhappy predicament, being so poor that they cannot live, while the air of their home is so healthy that they cannot die. F. A. H.

MR. JAMES HOOPER asks if " 'any reader of 'N. & Q' can say how 'downright Dunstable' became an equivalent for being drunk." This proverbial saying is used by Sir Walter Scott Mervyn, in writing to his friend Col. Mannering, without any reference to drunkenness. Arthur says: "And here, dear Mannering, I wish I could stop, for I have incredible pain in telling the rest If the librarian of St. Paul's knew, as DR. W. of my story......But I must still earn my college SPARROW SIMPSON assures us, 66 'a hawk from a nickname of Downright Dunstable" ("Guy Mannerhandsaw," it is evident that a dean of that cathe-ing,' chap. xvi.). JONATHAN BOUCHIER. dral at one period of his life did not know a cope from a chasuble. In Milman's play of 'Anne Boleyn' the following passage occurs :

I saw the arch-heretic enrobed

In the cope and pall of mitred Canterbury,
Lift the dread Host with misbelieving hands.

P. 13.

K. P. D. E.

I am not familiar with "downright Dunstable" in any other sense than that of plain speaking. See Brewer's 'Reader's Handbook." S. ILLINGWORTH BUTLER. A "CRANK" (8th S. ii. 408, 473; iii. 53).—Is "crank " an "odd American word"? I am unThe reference is to Archbishop Cranmer, and the able to give many English instances of it. I speaker one devoted to the old religion. suppose that Milton's "quips and cranks and wanton wiles," would scarcely be taken as a proper specimen of the modern acceptation of the term. Still, I hardly see where else it can be classed. Burton goes so far as to speak of a "counterfeit crank," and sets him down as cheater." In Beaumont and Fletcher's 'Wit at Several Weapons,' there figures a gentleman's gentleman called Pompey Doodle. He is servant to Sir Gregory Fop, and with great diligence patterns after his master, who is all that his name implies. Pompey is vain, empty, conceited, fond of using big words, and easily persuaded that

Shall I be forgiven if I say that one would not think of putting newspaper writers on a level with "Elia" and "Ingoldsby"? But when we are told that one priest "carried his tonsure in his hand," that another "practised celibacy in the open streets," that "thurifers were suspended from the roof," and that Mr. "Roffen. is the Bishop of Rochester's apparitor," we may even suppose, without detriment to their reputations, that neither Charles Lamb nor Harris Barham knew much of what is now understood as ritualism. Is it not

a lady is in love with him. A copy of Malvolio in many respects. Having dismissed his master, Sir Gregory speaks of him as "malapert" and "frampel" (or saucy), and a "cutter about ladies' honours," or a swaggerer. He sums up Pompey with, "Now he 's crank," because he thinks the young lady has set her affections on him. Is not this the meaning of the "odd American word"? Bailey's old 'Dictionary' defines a ship to be crank, "when she cannot bear her sail, or can bear but a small part of it for fear of oversetting." This is Pompey's case precisely; and will it not stand for the "crank" of the present day? I lately found the following definition of the word floating in the newspapers, "A crank is a specialist in something that you take no interest in." Like many other supposed Americanisms, "crank" is evidently at home in the realms of old English. DOLLAR.

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Crank has many other meanings besides those already given, though there is a family likeness in all these meanings. Two of our greatest writers use it, Shakspeare and Dickens, the former twice the latter once (to my recollection), and each time with a different application. Hotspur (Henry IV.,' first part, Act III. sc. i.) exclaims: See, how this river comes me cranking in, and cuts me from the best of all my land"; and it appears again in Venus and Adonis': "He cranks and crosses with a thousand doubles "-though there may be some similarity of application in this to the former use of the word as applied to a winding river, such as the Trent, of which Hotspur is speaking. As regards Dickens, in the seventh chapter of The Old Curiosity Shop' Dick Swiveller made "an observation to the effect that his friend appeared to be rather cranky' in point of temper." The friend was young Trent, which is perhaps somewhat of a coincidence, and, as Dickens puts cranky between inverted commas, he perhaps considered himself as quoting from some other author. Was it Shakspeare?

Barnes Common.

JNO. BLOUNDELLE-BURTON.

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in 1 Cor. i., where it evidently signifies the tortuous passages of the human body. Halliwell has, "Crank, an impostor. Burton." Here the twist would be a moral one. But does not the 'N. E. D.' tell us all about the word? C. C. B.

JOHN PALMER (8th S. iii. 87).—John Palmer, brewer, proprietor, and manager of the Bath and Bristol theatres, Post Office reformer, and originator of mail coaches, subsequently Mayor of Bath, and twice returned to Parliament as member for that city, married the daughter of the Duke of Richmond-Lady Madeline Gordon. He was succeeded as member for Bath by his son Major-General Palmer. A brief outline of the life of this public benefactor will be found in N. & Q.,' 5th S. vi. 307, 435, 514, and fuller particulars of the opposition to his scheme for expediting the transmission of letters throughout the country are given in 'Her Majesty's Mails, a History of the Post Office,' by William Lewins, p. 130-8. Palmer died at Brighton, August 16, 1818. EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

I would refer MR. DRURY to chap. vi. p. 25 in myAnnals of the Road,' on "John Palmer and the Mail Coach System." It was the mail, and not the stage, coach he introduced.

HAROLD MALET, Col.

477; iii. 72, 94).-MR. HEATHCOTE's correction PLAINNESS VERSUS BEAUTY (8th S. ii. 289, of the error with respect to the authorship of his charming poem 'Dorothy' is as necessary as it is welcome. I have several times seen it attributed to Lord Carlisle (and once to Carlyle) in country newspapers and in editorial "Answers to Correspondents." In an address on Women's Education,' given by the head master of Clifton College to the teachers and pupils of the high school there (a report of which will be found in the Journal of Education, March, 1888, pp. 130-2), twentyfour lines of the poem were quoted - probably from memory, as inaccuracies abound-and were attributed to "the late Lord Carlisle," as usual. I am very glad to see that the real author has now come forward. GEO. E. Dartnell.

THE HIPPODROME (8th S. iii. 47).-The Hippodrome was a racing ground, part of which is now occupied by Kensington Park Gardens. St. John's Church, Notting Hill, which was built in 1844, was called by the Notting Hillites of that day "The Hippodrome Church." RAVEN BROOKE.

Mr. John Whyte, at Notting Hill, on May 29, This place of fashionable resort was opened by 1837. It was surrounded by a lofty fence, and contained a steeplechase course of two and a quarter miles. A mound of raised ground occupied the centre, from which an excellent view of the course

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'MAYOR OF WIGAN' (7th S. x. 107, 172, 254; 8th S. iii. 118).-I am obliged to MR. HIPWELL for his information regarding the whereabouts of copies of Hillary Butler's Mayor of Wigan.' Since I last wrote to N. & Q.' upon this subject I have secured a copy of the book, which I chased at the Hailstone sale. Its extreme rarity and its strong local connexion with the borough of Wigan are its only recommendations. The Monthly Review of the year 1760, the date of its publication, describes it as a dirty story, poorly H. T. FOLKARD.

told."

Wigan Public Library.

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"OASTS" (8th S. iii. 107).-Does this word refer to innkeeper? See Ooste in Skeat's 'Middle English Dictionary,' which gives references to Matzner's 'Dictionary' and to Chaucer. PAUL BIERLEY.

COPPLESTONE FAMILY (8th S. iii. 47).-The current Devonshire couplet which S. W. R. finds in Kingsley's novel

Crocker, Crewys, and Coppleston,

When the Conqueror came, were all at home

is quoted in Murray's 'Handbook for Devon' in relation to the family of Coplestone (or Copleston), of Coplestone, a family which appears to have been seated at Coplestone in the time of King Eadgar (974). We are told in Murray's Handbook' that the "great Coplestones," as they were called, lived in ancient days at Coplestone in great

state.

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I find elsewhere that Sir John Copleston, a member of the family (possibly the head of it), lived at Warleigh, near Plymouth (no doubt the Warleck or Warlake of S. W. R.'s query), and I believe he was living there at the time of the heraldic visitation of 1620. This Sir John Copleston was lineally descended (through the families of Gorges and Bonville) from Robert Foliot of Warleigh, living 1285. The present owner of Warleigh, Mr. Radcliffe, is the direct descendant (through the families of Bastard and Bamfield) of Sir John Copleston. The estate of Warleigh, however, was acquired by the Radcliffes not by inheritance, but by purchase from John Bamfield, of Hestercombe, in 1741.

C. W. CASS.

There are memorials of this family in the Church of Colebrook, Devon. Consult Rogers's 'Tombs of Devon,' Polwhele's 'Hist. of Devon,' &c. War

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ABRAHAM RUDhall, Bell-Founder (7th S. xi. 4; xii. 207, 296).At Sotheby's rooms, April 11, 1859, there was sold in lot 1507 a rare broadside printed sheet (c. 1750), entitled--

"A Meditation upon Death, to the Tune of the Chimes at the Cathedral in Glocester, the Music by Jeffries, Organist at Glocester, &c., also the same tune set to the proper key of the Bells by Mr. Abr. Rudhall, Bell Founder in Gloucester."

W. I. R. V.

6

FOLK-LORE (8th S. ii. 305, 416, 511).—The following passage from Aubrey's Remains of Gentilisme and Judaisme,' p. 25, ed. 1881 (Folklore Society), explains the modus operandi with the sieve and shears :

"The magick of the Sive and Sheeres (I thinke) is in Virgil's Ecglogues.' The Sheers are stuck in a Sieve, and two maydens hold up y sieve with the top of their fingers by the handle of the shiers: then say, By St. Peter and St. Paule such a one hath stoln (such a thing), the others say, By St. Peter and St. Paul He hath not stoln it. After many such Adjurations, the Sieve will turne at y name of y Thiefe."

This is the way in which the Bible and key are manipulated. The key is made fast within the leaves of the Bible by tying so as to allow the handle to project above the top of the Bible. The two operators then each place the forefinger of the right hand underneath the handle. In my boyhood I often witnessed the performance of the operation. F. C. BIRKBECK TERRY.

STRACHEY FAMILY (8th S. ii. 508; iii. 14).— I take it that Shakspere's reference in 'Twelfth Night,' II. v., is a mere generality; thus, "The Lady of the strachey married the Yeoman of the Wardrobe "-a contrast. Strachey may be a corruption of strath, a valley; the lady owner of ten or twenty villages, in a broad fertile valley, is typical of wealth; while the "yeoman" might be a confidential attendant. It merely points to a disproportionate alliance, such as we find in the Tudor connexion; thus, Lady Mary Grey, sister of Queen Jane, married Martin Keyes, groom porter to Queen Elizabeth; her mother, Frances Brandon, Duchess of Suffolk, was remarried to Adrian Stokes; while her stepmother, another

Duchess of Suffolk, née Baroness Willoughby D'Eresby, accepted Richard Bertie, Esq., in second nuptials. All were commoners; and, while the last-named is well known and highly respected, I fail to collect adequate details of Keyes and Stokes. A. HALL.

I must beg leave to correct PROF. SKEAT in his misleading quotation of the " hopeless crux of Strachey in Twelfth Night.' If he will compare his note with the 1623 folio, he will find from the latter that the word is not spelt with a smalls, but is capitalized, and, as if to lend it greater importance, is put in italics. The hope that the word Conveyed to Elizabethan audiences a topical allusion will, I trust, not prove barren. JNO. MALONE.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE (8th S. ii. 461, 501; iii. 1, 41).—As the able contributor of the list of Mr. Gladstone's publications usually explains the circumstances under which each paper was penned, it may as well be mentioned that "Daniel O'Connell.-Nineteenth Century, January, 1889, pp. 149-68," is a complimentary review of The Private Correspondence of Daniel O'Connell,' edited by W. J. FitzPatrick (London, Murray,

1888).

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D. F. G.

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In the introduction to the "Waverley Dramas" (Glasgow, 1872), eight in number, founded on the novels of Sir Walter Scott, it is said "that he retired in 1851, and died shortly afterwards at St. Andrews." Mrs. Henry Siddons was his widowed sister, who sustained some of the female roles in the Edinburgh Theatre Royal in the same dramas with her brother.

Frank and Mrs. Henry Siddons that of Jeanie Deans. In 'The Bride of Lammermoor,' performed at Edinburgh (no date given in "The Waverley Dramas"), he sustained the part of Captain Craigengelt and Mrs. Henry Siddons that of Lucy Ashton. In 'Montrose; or, the Children of the Mist,' neither of them seems to have acted.

This information is taken from the abovementioned work, which contains many interesting particulars in the introduction concerning the adaptation of the "Waverley Novels" to the stage, and gives a list of the dramatis persona or cast of performers in each. Amongst them stands prominently Mackay, the inimitable Bailie Nicol Jarvie. There is an engraving of him in this character, and a very fine one in mezzotint of Mrs. Siddons as Isabella in The Fatal Marriage,' one of her most famous characters, holding by the hand her son, then a boy, presumably in after years the actor Mr. Henry Siddons. JOHN PICKFORD, M.A. Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.

"THE CHILDREN'S GARLAND' (8th S. iii. 48).Perhaps I may take advantage of SPINDLE'S Sand's son ?) in his illustration of the scene in 'Conquery to ask why Maurice Sand (query George suelo' in which Haydn, the composer, as a lad, is cutting off his fellow-pupil's beautiful queue, has represented Haydn as holding the scissors in his left hand and "the pigtail stout" with his right? It is seems to me that in a rape of the lock" the operator would do the very reverse. Was Haydn left-handed? The victim is also represented as writing on the board on the wall with his left hand. See the large double-columned edition of 'Consuelo,' 1855, p. 169. Is this episode in the youthful career of Haydn founded on fact?

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JONATHAN BOUCHIER.

[Maurice Sand is a son of the novelist.]

CHESNEY FAMILY (8th S. ii. 387, 478; iii. 58).— Burke, in his 'General Armory,' gives Az., an oak tree fructed ppr. as the arms of Chesne, of France. The Chateau de La Chesnaye, about fourteen In Waverley,' performed at Edinburgh in 1824, miles from the town of Issoudun and village of Mr. Murray played the part of the Laird of Bal Vatan, Department of Indre, France, formerly the mawhapple and Mrs. Henry Siddons that of Flora residence of Agnes Sorel, the beautiful mistress of Mac Ivor. In 'Guy Mannering,' represented at Charles VI., and now of Count Ferdinand de Edinburgh in 1818, he played the part of Dirk Lesseps, may have been in ages past the property Hatteraick. In 'The Antiquary,' represented at of the Chesnayes. Chesney is quite a familiar Edinburgh in 1820, Mr. Murray sustained the name in the county Antrim, where I believe the part of Jonathan Oldbuck. In 'Rob Roy,' acted ancestors of Major General Francis Rawdon at Edinburgh, 1819, he performed the part of Chesney, the author of the interesting Survey Captain Thornton. In 'Old Mortality,' performed of the Euphrates Valley,' originally resided. The at Edinburgh in 1823, he acted the part of name does not occur in the Roll of Battle Abbey. Grahame of Claverhouse and Mrs. Henry Siddons that of Edith Bellenden. In 'The Heart of MidLothian,' represented in Edinburgh in 1820 and

Dundrum, co. Down.

ELIZ. S. PIGOTT.

Cheney is written in half a dozen different ways 1823, Mr. Murray sustained the part of Black-De Cayneto, De Kaisneto, De Chaisneto, De

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