Various
Notes and Queries, Number 64, January 18, 1851

NOTES

AUTHORSHIP OF HENRY VIII

In my last communication on the subject of Henry VIII., I referred to certain characteristic tricks of Fletcher's style of frequent occurrence in that play, and I now beg leave to furnish you with a few instances. I wish it, however, to be understood, that I advance these merely as illustrative specimens selected at random; as there is scarcely a line of the portions of the play I assume to be Fletcher's but would furnish some evidence to a diligent student of this writer's style: and that, although I think each separate instance as strongly characteristic of Fletcher as it is unlike Shakspeare, it is only in their aggregate number that I insist upon their importance.

The first instance to which I call attention is the use of the substantive "one" in a manner which, though not very uncommon, is used by no writer so frequently as Fletcher. Take the following:—

"So great ones."—Woman's Prize, II. 2.
"And yet his songs are sad ones."—Two Noble Kinsmen, II. 4.

and the title of the play, The False One.

Compare with these from Henry VIII.:—

"This night he make a supper, and a great one."—Act I. 3.
"Shrewd ones."—"Lame ones."—"so great ones."—Ibid.
                                "I had my trial,
And must needs say a noble one."—Act II. 1.
"A wife—a true one."—Act III. 1.
"They are a sweet society of fair ones."—Act I. 4.

Fletcher habitually uses "thousand" without the indefinite article, as in the following instances:

"Carried before 'em thousand desolations."—False One, II. 9.
"Offers herself in thousand safeties to you."—Rollo, II. 1.
"This sword shall cut thee into thousand pieces."—Knight of Malta, IV. 2.

In Henry VIII. we have in the prologue:

                        "Of thousand friends."
"Cast thousand beams upon me."—Act IV. 2.

The use of the word "else" is peculiar in its position in Fletcher:—

"'Twere fit I were hang'd else."—Rule a Wife, II.
"I were to blame else."—Ibid.
"I've lost me end else."—Act IV.
"I am wide else."—Pilgrim, IV. 1.

In Henry VIII., the word occurs in precisely the same position:—

"Pray God he do! He'll never know himself, else."—Act II. 2.
"I were malicious, else."—Act IV. 2.

The peculiarly idiomatic expression "I take it" is of frequent occurrence in Fletcher, as witness the following:—

"This is no lining for a trench, I take it."—Rule a Wife, III.
"And you have land i' th' Indies, as I take it."—Ibid. IV.
"A fault without forgiveness, as I take it."—Pilgrim, IV. 1.
"In noble emulation (so I take it)."—Ibid. IV. 2.

In one scene of Henry VIII., Act I. 3., the expression occurs twice: "One would take it;" "There, I take it."

Of a peculiar manner of introducing a negative condition, one instance from Fletcher, and one from Henry VIII. in reference to the same substantive, though used in different senses, will suffice:

                                "All noble battles,
Maintain'd in thirst of honour, not of blood."—Bonduca, V. 1.
                                "And those about her
From her shall read the perfect ways of honour,
And by those claim their greatness, not by blood."—Henry VIII., V. 4.

Of a kind of parenthetical asseveration, a single instance, also, from each will suffice:

"My innocent life (I dare maintain it, Sir)."—Wife for a Month, IV. 1.
"A woman (I dare say, without vain glory)
Never yet branded with suspicion."—Henry VIII., III. 1.

"A great patience," in Henry VIII., may be paralleled by "a brave patience," in The Two Noble Kinsmen: and the expression "aim at," occurring at the close of the verse (as, by the bye, almost all Fletcher's peculiarities do) as seen in Act III. 1.,

"Madam, you wander from the good we aim at,"

is so frequently to be met with in Fletcher, that, having noted four instances in the Pilgrim, three in the Custom of the Country, and four in the Elder Brother, I thought I had found more than enough.

Now, Sir, on reading Henry VIII., and meeting with each of these instances, I felt that I remembered "the trick of that voice;" and, without having at present by me any means for reference, I feel confident that of the commonest examples not so many can be found among all the rest of the reputed plays of Shakspeare, as in Henry VIII. alone, or rather in those parts of Henry VIII. which I reject as Shakspeare's; while of the more remarkable, I think I might challenge the production of a single instance.

My original intention in the present paper was merely to call attention to a few such expressions as the foregoing; but I cannot resist the impulse to quote one or two parallels of a different character:—

Henry VIII.:
"The dews of heaven fall thick in blessings on her!"—Act IV. 2.

Fletcher:
"The dew of sleep fall gently on you, sweet one!"—Elder Brother, IV. 3.
"Blessings from heaven in thousand showers fall on ye!"—Rollo, II. 3.
"And all the plagues they can inflict, I wish it,
Fall thick upon me!"—Knight of Malta, III. 2.

Henry VIII.:
                                "To-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms."—Act III. 2.

Fletcher:
"My long-since-blasted hopes shoot out in blossoms."—Rollo, II. 3.

These instances, of course, prove nothing; yet they are worth the noting. If, however, I were called upon to produce two passages from the whole of Fletcher's writings most strikingly characteristic of his style, and not more in expression than in thought, I should fix upon the third scene of the first act of Henry VIII., and the soliloquy of Wolsey, Beginning—

"Farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness!"

In conclusion, allow me to remark, that I am quite content to have been anticipated by MR. SPEDDING in this discovery (if discovery you and your readers will allow it to be), for the satisfaction I am thereby assured of in the concurrence of so acute a critic as himself, and of a poet so true as the poet-laureate.

SAMUEL HICKSON.

Dec. 10. 1850.

THE CAVALIER'S FAREWELL

The following song is extracted from the MS. Diary of the Rev. John Adamson (afterwards Rector of Burton Coggles, Lincolnshire) commencing in 1658. Can any of your readers point out who was the author?—

"THE CAVALIER'S FAREWELL TO HIS MISTRESS BEING CALLED TO THE WARRS."

1.
"Ffair Ffidelia tempt no more,
I may no more thy deity adore
Nor offer to thy shrine,
I serve one more divine
And farr more great y{^n} you:
    I must goe,
    Lest the foe
Gaine the cause and win the day.
Let's march bravely on
Charge ym in the Van
Our Cause God's is,
Though their odds is
    Ten to one.

2.
"Tempt no more, I may not yeeld
    Although thine eyes
    A Kingdome may surprize:
    Leave off thy wanton toiles
    The high borne Prince of Wales
Is mounted in the field,
    Where the Royall Gentry flocke.
        Though alone
        Nobly borne
    Of a ne're decaying Stocke,
    Cavaleers be bold
    Bravely hold your hold,
    He that loyters
    Is by Traytors
        Bought and sold.

3.
"One Kisse more and yn farewell
        Oh no, no more,
        I prethee giue me ore.
    Why cloudest thou thy beames,
    I see by these extreames,
A Woman's Heaven or Hell.
    Pray the King may haue his owne,
        And the Queen
        May be seen
    With her babes on England's Throne.
    Rally up your Men,
    One shall vanquish ten,
    Victory we
    Come to try thee
        Once agen.

Query: Who was the author of the above?

F.H.

GRAY'S ELEGY

J.F.M. (Vol. i., p. 101.) remarks, "I would venture to throw out a hint, that an edition of this Elegy, exhibiting all the known translations, arranged in double columns, might be made a noble monument to the memory of Gray." It has been asserted that there is scarcely a thought in this Elegy that Gray has not borrowed from some writer, ancient or modern and if this be true, I would take the liberty of adding a hint to that of J.F.M., namely, that the proposed edition should contain a third column, exhibiting all the known plagiarisms in this famous Elegy. To begin with the first line—

"The curfew tolls the knell of parting day."

Lord Byron, in his notes to the third canto of Don Juan, says that this was adopted from the following passage in Dante's Purgatory, canto viii.:

—– "si ode squilla di lontano
Che paja 'l giorno pianger che si muore."

And it is worthy of notice that this passage corresponds with the first line of Giannini's translation of the Elegy, as quoted by J.F.M.:—

"Piange la squilla 'l giorno, che si muore."

I must add, however, that long before Lord Byron thought of writing Don Juan, Mr. Cary, in his excellent translation of the Italian poet, had noticed this plagiarism in Gray; and what is more, had shown that the principal thought, the "giorno che si muore," was borrowed by Dante from Statius's

"Jam moriente die."

HENRY H. BREEN.

St. Lucia, West Indies, Nov. 1850.

[The preceding communication was accompanied by several others, and by the following gratifying letter, which we print as a fresh proof that our paper is fulfilling the object for which it was instituted, namely, that of promoting literary intercourse between men of letters throughout the world and that it is as favourably received by our fellow countrymen abroad, as it has been by those who are enabled to receive it wet from the press:—

"Owing to the difficulty of procuring the early numbers of 'NOTES AND QUERIES,' especially at this distance from Britain, I have been compelled to wait for its publication in a collected form. I am now in possession of the first volume, and beg leave to offer you a few Notes which have occurred to me on perusing its contents. I am fully sensible of the disadvantage of corresponding with you from so remote a corner of the globe, and am prepared to find some of my remarks anticipated by other correspondents nearer home; but having deeply suffered from the literary isolation consequent upon a residence of twenty-one years in this country, I shall gladly submit to any disadvantage which shall not involve a total exclusion from the means of inter-communication so opportunely afforded by your excellent periodical.

"HENRY H. BREEN."]

THE NINEVEH MONUMENTS AND MILTON'S NATIVITY ODE ILLUSTRATED FROM LUCIAN

Layard in his Nineveh, vol. ii., p. 471., in his description of "the sacred emblems carried by the priests," says, they are principally the fruit or cone of the pine.

"… and the square utensil which, as I have already remarked, appears to have been of embossed or engraved metal, or of metal carved to represent wicker work, or sometimes actually of wicker work."

He adds, that M. Lajard "has shown the connection between the cone of the cypress and the worship of Venus in the religious systems of the East;" that it has been suggested that "the square vessel held the holy water," that, "however this may be, it is evident from their constant occurrence on Assyrian monuments, that they were very important objects in religious ceremonies. Any attempt to explain their use and their typical meaning, can at present be little better than ingenious speculation."

There is a passage in Lucian De Dea Syria, §. 13., which may serve to elucidate this feature in the Nineveh marbles. He is referring to the temple of Hierapolis and a ceremony which Deucalion was said to have introduced, as a memorial of the great flood and the escaping of the waters:

"Δις εκαστου ετεος εκ θαλασσης υδωρ ες τον νηον απικνεεται· φερουσι δε ουκ ιρεες μουνον αλλα πασα Συριη και Αραβιη, και περηθεν του Ευφρητεω, πολλοι ανθρωποι ες θαλασσαν ερχονται, και παντες υδωρ φερουσαι, τα, πρωτα μεν εν τωι νηωι εκχρουσι," &c.

"Twice every year water is brought from the sea to the temple. Not only the priests, but" all Syria and Arabia, "and many from the country beyond the Euphrates come to the sea, and all bring away water, which they first pour out in the temple," and then into a chasm which Lucian had previously explained had suddenly opened and swallowed up the flood of waters which had threatened to destroy the world. Tyndale, in his recent book on Sardinia, refers to this passage in support of a similar utensil appearing in the Sarde paganism.

It may be interesting to refer to another passage in the Dea Syria, in which Lucian is describing the splendour of the temple of Hierapolis; he says that the deities themselves are really present:—

"Και Θεοι δε καρτα αυτοισι εμφανεες· ιδρωει γαρ δη ων παρα σφισι τα ξοατα,"

When the very images sweat, and he adds, are moved and utter oracles. It is probable Milton had this in recollection when, in his noble Nativity Ode, he sings of the approach of the true Deity, at whose coming

"… the chill marble seems to sweat,
While each peculiar power foregoes his wonted seat."

L.I.M.

MINOR NOTES

Gaudentio di Lucca.—Sir James Mackinstosh, in his Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, adverts to the belief that Bishop Berkeley was the author of Gaudentio di Lucca, but without adopting it.

"A romance," he says, "of which a journey to an Utopia, in the centre of Africa, forms the chief part, called The Adventures of Signor Gaudentio di Lucca, has been commonly ascribed to him; probably on no other ground than its union of pleasing invention with benevolence and elegance."—Works, vol. i. p. 132. ed. 1846.

Sir J. Mackintosh, like most other modern writers who mention the book, seems not to have been aware of the decisive denial of this report, by Bishop Berkeley's son, inserted in the third volume of Kippis's Biographia Britannica.

L.

George Wither, the Poet, a Printer (Vol. ii., p. 390.).—In addition to DR. RIMBAULT'S extract from Wither's Britain's Remembrancer, showing that he printed (or rather composed) every sheet thereof with his own hand, I find, in a note to Mr. R.A. Willmott's volume of the Lives of the English Sacred Poets, in that interesting one of George Wither, the following corroboration of this singular labour of his: the poem, independent of the address to the King and the præmonition, consisting of between nine and ten thousand lines, many of which, I doubt not, were the production of his brain while he stood at the printing-case. A MS. note of Mr. Park's, in one of the many volumes of Wither which I possess, confirms me in this opinion.

"Ben Jonson, in Time Vindicated, has satirized the custom, then very prevalent among the pamphleteers of the day, of providing themselves with a portable press, which they moved from one hiding-place to another with great facility. He insinuates that Chronomastix, under whom he intended to represent Wither, employed one of these presses. Thus, upon the entrance of the Mutes,—

"Fame. What are this pair?

Eyes. The ragged rascals?

Fame. Yes.

Eyes. These rogues; you'd think them rogues,
But they are friends;
One is his printer in disguise, and keeps
His press in a hollow tree."

From this extract it should seem that Wither not only composed the poem at case (the printer's phrase), but worked it off at press with his own hands.

J.M.G.

Worcester.

"Preached as a dying Man to dying Men" (Vol. i., p. 415.; Vol. ii., p. 28.).—Some time ago there appeared in this series (Vol. i., p. 415.) a question respecting a pulpit-phrase which has occasionally been used by preachers, delivering their messages as "dying men to dying men." This was rightly traced (Vol. ii., p. 28.) to a couplet of the celebrated Richard Baxter, who, in one of his latest works, speaking of his ministerial exercises, says,—

"I preach'd as never sure to preach again,
And as a dying man to dying men."

The passage occurs in one of his "Poetical Fragments," entitled "Love breathing Thanks and Praise."

This small volume of devotional verse is further entitled, Heart Imployment with GOD and Itself; the concordant Discord of a Broken-healed Heart; Sorrowing, Rejoicing, Fearing, Hoping, Dying, Living: published for the Use of the Afflicted. The Introduction is dated "London: at the Door of Eternity, Aug. 7. 1681."

He yet survived ten years, in the course of which he was twice imprisoned and fined under the profligate and persecuting reigns of Charles II. and James II. for his zeal and piety.

J.M.G.

Hallamshire.

Authors of Anonymous Works.—On the title-page of the first volume of my copy of The Monthly Intelligencer for 1728 and 1729, which was published anonymously, is written in MS., "By the Rev. Mr. Kimber."

This book belonged to, and is marked with the autograph of D. Hughes, 1730; but the MS. note was written by another hand.

P.H.F.

Umbrellas (Vol. ii., pp. 491. 523., &c.).—I have talked with an old lady who remembered the first umbrella used in Oxford, and with another who described the surprise elicited by the first in Birmingham. An aunt of mine, born 1754, could not remember when the house was without one, though in her youth they were little used. May not the word umbrella have been applied to various sorts of impluvia? Swift, in his "Description of a City Shower," says:—

"Now in contiguous drops the flood comes down,
Threatening with deluge this devoted town.
To shops in crowds the dangled females fly,
Pretend to cheapen goods, but nothing buy.
The Templar spruce, while every spout's abroach,
Stays till 'tis fair, yet seems to call a coach.
The tuck'd-up sempstress walks with hasty strides,
While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides."

Tatler, No. 238. Oct. 17. 1710.

This might be applied to an oiled cape, but I think the passage quoted by MR. CORNEY (Vol. ii., p. 523.) signifies something carried over the head.

By the way, the "Description of a City Shower" contains one of the latest examples of ache as a dissyllable:—

"A coming shower your shooting corns presage,
Old aches throb, your hollow tooth will rage."

H.B.C.

U.U. Club, Jan.

QUERIES

SONNET (QUERY, BY MILTON) ON THE LIBRARY AT CAMBRIDGE

In a Collection of Recente and Witty Pieces by several eminente hands, London, printed by W.S. for Simon Waterfou, 1628, p. 109., is the following sonnet, far the best thing in the book:—

"ON THE LIBRARIE AT CAMBRIDGE

"In that great maze of books I sighed and said,—
    It is a grave-yard, and each tome a tombe;
    Shrouded in hempen rags, behold the dead,
    Coffined and ranged in crypts of dismal gloom,
    Food for the worm and redolent of mold,
    Traced with brief epitaph in tarnished gold—
    Ah, golden lettered hope!—ah, dolorous doom!
    Yet mid the common death, where all is cold,
    And mildewed pride in desolation dwells,
    A few great immortalities of old
    Stand brightly forth—not tombes but living shrines,
    Where from high sainte or martyr virtue wells,
    Which on the living yet work miracles,
Spreading a relic wealth richer than golden mines.

"J.M. 1627."

Attached to it, it will be seen, are the initials J.M. and the date 1627. Is it possible that this may be an early and neglected sonnet of Milton? and yet, could Milton have seriously perpetrated the pun in the second line?

C. HOWARD KENYON.

BURYING IN CHURCH WALLS

(Vol. ii., p. 513.)

MR. W. DURRANT COOPER has mentioned some instances of burials in the walls of churches; it is not however clear whether in these the monument, or coffin lid, is in the inside or the outside of the wall.

Stone coffin lids, with and without effigies, are very frequently found placed under low arches hollowed in the wall in the interior of the church: tombs placed in the exterior of the wall are much less common; and the singularity of their position, leads one to look for some peculiar reason for it. Tradition often accounts for it by such stories as those mentioned by MR. COOPER. Such is the case with a handsome canopied tomb (I think with an effigy) on the south side of the choir of the cathedral of Lichfield, where we are told that the person interred died under censure of the church. Other instances which I have noticed, are, at—

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.