other irregularities of Tuscan speech are to be found in a grammar prefixed to the second volume of Baretti's Italian Dictionary.'

MR. INGLEBY is mistaken with regard to the Italian use of voi when addressing royalty. His remarks will doubtless receive attention elsewhere; but perhaps I may be allowed to add a line or two respecting some peculiarities of construction observed in other idioms in regal and official style. In Spanish, for instance, nos and vos are used for nosotros and vosotros, instead of the singular, as: "Nos Don N., Óbispo de Toledo, os mandamos." The second person plural is used in Portuguese also in addressing royalty; both Spanish and Portuguese differ, however, from Italian in that the adjectives and participles do not agree with the attribute, but with the gender of the person. Therefore, "Vostra Maestà è stata ingannata is rendered in Spanish "Vuestra Magestad ha sido engañado," when addressing a king, and "engañada" in the case of a princess.

The so-called "plural of majesty" occurs often in Shakespeare: e. g., "We ourself will follow in the main battle" ('Rich. III."); "In our remove be thou at full ourself" ( Meas. for Meas.'). A phrase, repeatedly used not long ago by the present Premier in addressing the Queen, attracted some attention, and was at the time burlesqued by Punch: "Mr. Gladstone presents his humble duty to your Majesty." This is exactly in accordance with the Spanish formula: "El Señor G. puesto á los reales piés de Vuestra Magestad, humildemente le ofrece sus respetos," where the same apparent incongruity of persons is reproduced.

German Court phraseology also presents some singular divergences from ordinary rule: "Seine "Ihre Majestät, der König, haben befohlen"; Majestät, die Königin, sind ausgefahren"; "wenn Ihre Majestät befehlen," and such like.

A Portuguese anomaly is the substitution of the Spanish article el for the Portuguese o when referring to their king, who is styled el-rei; any other king is termed o rei; d'el-rei and do rei differ in that the former refers to the King of Portugal and the latter to the king of another country. J. YOUNG.

common conversation, it
rect in elegant prose.'

"

In Italian books my attention has frequently been directed to this idiom, as by Buommattei ('Della Ling. Tosc.,' Milan, 1807, ii. 285, 314); the author of a 'Vocabolario......per agevolare la lettura degli Autori' (Paris, 1768, s. v. “Preteriti"); an anonymous Gramatica' (Parma, 1771, p. 114); Soave (Gramatica,' Milan, 1816, p. 58); Mastrofini ('Dizionario...... de' Verbi,' Milan, 1830, i. 67, 76, et passim); Corticelli (Regole......della Lingua Tosc.,' Turin, 1846, pp. 81, 85). It is used by Machiavelli not only in verse, but in prose (Arte della Guerra,' lib. vii., in 'Opere,' Milan, 1798, viii. 289), Agnolo Firenzuola (‘La Trinuzia,' III. i.; 'I Lucidi,' I. ii.), and Benvenuto Cellini, whose editor, Carpani (Milan, 1821, ii. 203), has the following note to voi avevi :—

"I Fiorentini adoperano ordinariamente negli imperfetti de' verbi la seconda persona del singolare anche per la seconda del plurale; così voi eri, voi fosti, voi saresti, e simili si leggono spesso negli Scrittori i più autorevoli in lingua italiana."

Here is the conjugation of the imperfect indicative of essere and avere as given by the Florentine Lorenzo Franciosini in his 'Vocabolario Italiano e Spagnolo' (Rome, 1620, pp. 10, 19): Io ero, tu eri, quello era, noi eramo, voi eri, quello erano. Io havevo, tu havevi, quello haveva, noi havevamo, voi havevi, quelli havevano. All the verbs are conjugated in accordance with this paradigm, and the assimilation of plural to singular in the second person takes place also in the perfect definite indicative and both past tenses of the subjunctive. Franciosini acknowledges no other conjugation.

DR. CHANCE says that voi with the singular verb-form is used in addressing a single individual; but there is no question of numerical restriction in the authorities I have cited. Mastrofini affirms unconditionally (i. 68): "In Firenze non si dice altro mai che voi avevi, ed avevate sarebbe affettazione"; and Nannucci, in his 'Analisi de' Verbi' (Florence, 1843, pp. 144, 145), quotes two verses from the younger Buonarotti's La Tancia,' in which plurality is unquestionable :

E come v'eri prima amiche siate.-II. i.

O che badavi voi, dismemorati ?—V. v. DR. CHANCE's explanation seems to me unexceptionable save in one point, viz., his assumption -the assumption upon which Carpani's note is based-that in voi avevi the singular is used for the plural. The use of singular verb-persons for plural by old writers, even Tuscan, is of frequent occurrence, says the editor of the Leggenda di san Petronio,' commenting on quilli tene written where a modern would write quegli tengono; and in verse of the thirteenth century I have met with sai for sapete and fai for fate (real plural) and fanno. But the example we are considering appears to be simply an Italian corruption of Latin habebatis

·

not a borrowed singular, but a dialectal plural form. Prof. Nannucci, at the place already cited, exhibits the etymological changes in the instance of voi amavi as follows: from amabatis to amabati, then with elimination of t to amavai (cf. Spanish amabais), and finally, with syncope of a for facility of pronunciation, to amavi. For avevi the process would be habebatis, habebati, havevai, havevi. As to the singular tu amavi, Nannucci observes that whereas its true form was amava (Latin amabas) the change to i was determined by the personending of the present (tu ami). The idiom appears to have passed into familiar Tuscan speech from the Florentine, where, as I have shown, it was in high literary honour; but Nannucci says it was not wholly confined to the Florentines, and quotes the following verses—

Sospira il core quando mi sovvene

Che voi m'amavi, ed ora non m'amatefrom Fra Guittone, the Aretine poet commemorated by Dante in the 'Purgatorio.' Dante himself never uses this idiom, and it is worth noting that he blames Guittone "et quosdam alios" as 66 nunquam in vocabulis atque constructione desuetos plebescere" (De Vulg. Eloq.,' i. 13).

My objection to DR. CHANCE's explanation, however, does not affect his theory; for the populace do not talk etymology, and doubtless use avevi instead of avevate for the reason he assigns. It is the sound of the longer word that is disliked by people so addicted to word-clipping. Noi éramo is in use for the same reason. Any one saying eravamo "sarebbe da tutti forse burlato" (Buommattei, ii. 314). Oddly enough, the people fail here to be more accurate than the grammarians only by reason of their throwing back of the accent under the influence of the third person érano. The poets, with whom eramo is in general use, always keep the accent in the right position, i. e., on the penultimate. F. ADAMS.

105, Albany Road, Camberwell, S.E. "YELE" (8th S. i. 294, 341, 442, 462; ii. 177, 414, 476). The last communication under this head requires that I should say that the replies to my query have been instructive. While thank ing those who were good enough to give them, I may say that there was no intention of discourtesy when I wrote in May last.

F. J.

SIR GEORGE DOWNING (8th S. ii. 464).-Pepys has several entries, all more or less prejudiced. Sir George was a trimmer. January 28, 1659/60, he was to sail for Holland, salary 1,800l. per annum. He was knighted in Holland, May 21, 1660. He arrests three regicides on March 12, 1611/2, "like a perfidious rogue." As some compensation we find, May 27, 1667, that he was "active and a man of business, and values himself upon having of things do well under his hand."

A. HALL.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

The Attis of Caius Valerius Catullus. Translated into
English Verse, with Dissertation, &c., by Grant
Allen, B.A. (Nutt.)

To his Bibliothèque de Carabas" Mr. Nutt has added the text of the 'Attis,' a translation by Mr. Grant Allen, Attis," on "The Origin of Tree Worship," and on "The with an introduction and dissertations on "The Myth of Galliambic Metre," by the same eloquent, erudite, and assiduous ex-Postmaster of Merton College. Like the previous volumes of the series, it is a treasure to the bibliophile, a book on which the hand lingers caressingly. It is, moreover, a valuable addition to Into all he has to say upon the galliambic metre there scholarship and an important contribution to folk-lore. is no strong temptation to follow a writer who is always ingenious and always modest, if not always thoroughly convincing. In respect to the myth of Attis and the origin of tree worship, all that Mr. Allen has to say is of deepest interest and significance. Starting from the point of view of Mr. Herbert Spencer in deriving polytheism from ghost worship and ancestor worship, and accepting the theory of Mr. Frazer, in 'The Golden Bough,' that Attis was originally a tree spirit, Mr. Allen carries out his argument as to the close relationship between ancestor worship, stone worship, tree worship, " and the cult of the corn spirit in his various forms as man or animal, pine tree or cedar." To explain in a few sentences the manner in which Mr. Allen arrives at this conclusion is obviously impossible. There are few readers who follow his argument, luminously expressed, without he traces to their source the various forms of sacrifice yielding to his reasoning. With admirable lucidity collected in Mr. Tylor's Primitive Culture,' and lately dealt with briefly by us in reviewing Mr. Baring Gould's 'Curious Survivals,' and he establishes his position that to understand the origin of tree worship "we must directly affiliate it upon primitive ancestor or ghost worship, of which it is an aberrant and highly specialized offshoot." Most warmly do we commend to our readers a noble and far-reaching book.

English Writers.-An Attempt towards a History of
English Literature. By Henry Morley, LL.D. Vol. IX.
We are glad to welcome another instalment of Prof.
Spenser and his Time. (Cassell & Co.)
Morley's magnum opus. The book opens with a curious
first sentence," was born in Lancashire." A few pages
slip. "Edmund Spenser," Prof. Morley tells us, in the
further on he assures us that he was certainly born in
London. Though Spenser appears to have belonged to
North-east Lancashire, his parentage is more or less
a family of that name which had long been resident in
conjectural, and no record of his birth has been dis-
covered. Spencer himself names London as the place of
his birth in the Prothalamion,' while tradition fixes the
spot at East Smithfield, near the Tower. The book is
full of interesting matter, and should be widely read.
Besides Spenser, who is the principal figure in these
pages, we make the acquaintance of Sir Walter Raleigh,
Sir Philip Sidney, William Camden, Richard Hakluyt,

John Lyly, George Peele, Robert Greene, Christopher
Marlowe, Richard Hooker, and a host of other worthies
more or less known to fame. We miss the "Last Leaves,"
which have always been a feature of the " English
Writers," and the bibliography, which was deferred from
the eighth volume, is still absent. We trust that Prof.
Morley will be able to find room for it in the next
volume, which is to treat of 'Shakespeare and his Time.'
Stoke d'Abernon: its Church and Manor: (Privately
Printed.)
WE have here, in a thin and handsomely illustrated
volume, an account, historical, antiquarian, and artistic,
of what, in spite of restorations, must be regarded as one
of our most interesting parish churches. It is written
in a becoming spirit of reverence, and supplies the kind
of information we should be glad to possess with regard
to scores of other churches of the class. Both the inside
and the outside of the church are depicted, and two
monumental brasses of unique interest are reproduced
and described, as are other objects of interest. The
workmanship is thorough, and we can only commend to
local antiquaries an imitation of this important work,
zealously and anonymously accomplished.

work even more important for English readers than the one before us. We trust that when it appears it may have copious additional annotations, and that in every case the new matter may be distinguished from the old. The Ancient Laws of Wales. By the late Hubert Lewis. Edited by J. E. Lloyd. (Stock.) We have been in the habit of calling ourselves AngloSaxone, and assuming that all our institutions were derived from a Teutonic source. The late Mr. Kemble, Sir Francis Palgrave, and other students of the first rank have given currency to this idea. It was no fault of theirs; they were far too well instructed to assume that all our institutions came from Germanic sources; but careless readers with a prejudice in favour of those things which were easily grasped by the understanding have jumped to the conclusion that they rejected everything upon which they have not dwelt at length. This prejudice against everything Celtic has been fostered by the wild surmises of certain Welsh and Irish men, who have written in a way to lead people to suppose that they believed that all our institutions came from The fact is, as every unprejudiced Celtic sources. modern must admit, the Celts and the Teutons were very near kinsmen, and their institutions much alike. Hierurgia; or, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. With The Celts seem to have arrived in this island before Notes and Dissertations by Daniel Rock, D.D. Third their Teutonic cousins, but the relationship was so close Edition, revised by W. H. Weale. 2 vols. (Hodges.) that it does not appear likely that we shall ever be able to THE first edition of Dr. Rock's well-known book on the separate those things which are derived either from one ceremonial of the Eucharistic service was published well-stock or the other. The late Mr. Lewis did a great service nigh sixty years ago. It was soon succeeded by a second. to historical science by showing that it is possible-proBoth have become so scarce that when copies occur bable, in fact-that many of the institutions which we for sale they commonly realize much more than the are in the habit of regarding as more especially Teuoriginal price. tonic may with equal probability be derived from Celtic Bources. It is impossible to follow him step by step, but we may remark that no student of institutions can for the future afford to overlook his chapters on "The Hundred and the Riding," on "Manor Courts," and on "Trial by Jury." They are all of them important contributions to knowledge. We cannot say so much for all other parts of the volume. The chapter on "Common Fields and Local Nomenclature contains statements which we feel bound to question.

Mr. Weale has done a service to the public by bring ing out this new edition. He has done little more than correct the text and in a few instances enlarge the notes, except in the case of the annotations on the rubrics of the missal. We do not doubt that these are in almost every case improvements, but we wish that Mr. Weale had furnished the reader with some means of distinguishing between the work of the author and his editor. Half of the work is devoted to the theology of the Latin Church. With this N. & Q.' has no concern; but the rest is of the greatest importance for every antiquary whose tastes lead him in the direction of the mediaval Church and her offices.

Dr. Rock was by far the greatest of English ritualiste, using the word in its true meaning of one learned in ritual. Until the issue of 'Hierurgia' there was no book in our language which gave any reasonable information as to the old rites and the objects connected with them. The most cultured people fell into what would now be considered the strangest mistakes. One eminent poet speaks of a cross as a crucifix, and another makes one of his characters talk of seeing an archbishop celebrate mass in a cope. Since those days many books of a not dissimilar kind have appeared, but not one of them has in any way superseded Dr. Rock's monumental work. He had not only a thorough knowledge of the ritual of medieval England, but had also spent many years in the study of that of Italy, France, and the churches of the East. The engravings given of the vestments of the Greek clergy will be found most useful by those who desire to trace the ancient vestments up to their earliest forms.

It is not possible for us to give in the space at our command an idea of the treasure of knowledge of all kinds to be found in these volumes, and we are sorry to find that the index furnishes but a very imperfect key to them. It ought to have been more copious.

We believe that the same publisher is about to issue a new edition of Dr. Rock's Church of our Fathers,' a

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