A HIGHWAYMAN'S RIDE FROM LONDON TO YORK (3rd S. xii. 418.)- Permit me to reply to the concluding remarks of your correspondent T. B. upon this subject, and to say that Nevison House, in the township of Upsall, still stands. It has the appearance of being built about the reign of Charles II., and of being of a better class than those usually occupied by tenant farmers of that time. It had a centre and two wings, the latter long fallen into decay. A partition wall, doing duty for a main one, fell in the other day, and I as owner rebuilt it, preserving as before therein the the large iron initials W. N. and the reversed horseshoes. I have no sort of authority to say "Swift Nick" was born at Upsall, but I do maintain such an hypothesis is as good as Pontefract or Wakefield. When Mr. Grainge was about to publish his Vale of Mowbray great trouble was taken by several gentlemen and myself to glean any information relative to this freebooter, whom Macaulay does not neglect to hand down to future ages. "N. & Q." and every other available source were applied to without any avail. All we did find out was that neither at Pontefract nor Wakefield did any official record exist of Nevison being born at either place. In the parish register, South Kilvington, in which the township of Upsall is situated, are "1711. Eliz. ye daughter of Mr Will. Nevesson, bapt. Nov. 7." "1720. Mr William Nevison, bur. Mar. 26." It seems to me, therefore, that the birthplace of Nevison is as difficult to identify as that of Homer. EDMD. H. TURTON. HOMERIC TRADITIONS (3rd S. xii. 372.) - MR. L'ESTRANGE is uneasy because Sophocles ascribes to Ajax the preservation of the Grecian fleet from fire, whilst Homer ascribes it to Patroclus. The Times of November 25, 1867, says that the convict Larkin was supported on the scaffold at Manchester by a prison warder and the hangman's assistant. The Daily Telegraph says that he was supported by the warder only. The Morning Advertiser says that the hangman's assistant only held up the sufferer. When three special correspondents, specially admitted to give a correct description, cannot unanimously describe what passed before their eyes, I do not think that MR. L'ESTRANGE need wonder at the disagreement between Homer and Sophocles describing a fact known to them only by tradition. J. WILKINS, B.C.L. INTRODUCTION OF CABBAGES INTO ENGLAND BY SIR A. ASHLEY (3rd S. xii. 287.)-Hartlib (writing 1650) states that old men, then living, remembered the first gardener who came into Surrey to plant cabbages and cauliflowers, and to sow turnips, carrots, parsnips, and early peas-all of which at that time were great wonders, as having few or none in England but what came from Holland or Flanders. This gardener came from Sandwich with cabbages raised from seed, brought from Artois by the Flemish emigrants in 1561. Sir Anthony Ashley's cabbages, therefore, had not spread widely in the vicinity of London. "2 colley-flowers cost, in 1619, three shillings' (bill of fare for the inauguration dinner of Dulwich College, in Lysons's London). As eighteenpence was the price then paid for mowing an acre of hay, which now costs five shillings, cauliflowers must have been a rarity at that date also. J. WILKINS, B.C.L. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NUTS: WARD AND ALEXIS OF PIEMONT (3rd S. xii. 389.)—The editorial note given with my communication on the above subject alleges, and, so far as my means of reference go, correctly, that the edition of the Secrets of Alexis vouch, however, for the existence of such an ediof 1614-15 is unknown to bibliographers. I can tion, for I possess a copy of it. It is divided into five parts, and has three titles, the third serving for the last three parts. The second and third titles have the date 1614, but the first and general title 1615. The imprint is as follows: "London: Printed by William Stansby for Richard Meighen and Thomas Iones, and are to be sold at their shop with-out Temple-Barre vnder St. Clement's Church, 1615." 348 leaves, not including table, 14 leaves. Ward's having written any substantive work on The objection that there exists no trace of angling, is scarcely one at all, Lauson being in precisely the same case, while even Markham was but a trader in other men's wits, as far as his treatises on the sport are concerned. The three men are not unfairly linked, and it must be remembered that at the period in question (Hockenhull's verses were probably written before the advent of Walton, and certainly of Venables) a triad of original angling writers would have been hard to find. T. WESTWOOD. LINLITHGOW PALACE (3rd S. xii. 430.)-"A TRAVELLER" seems unaware of the fact that, about three years ago, it was proposed to partially restore this palace by converting its principal apartments into a county hall and public offices. The proposal was seriously entertained, but was ultimately abandoned, out of deference to the wishes of Scottish antiquaries. CHARLES ROGERS, LL.D. 2, Heath Terrace, Lewisham, S.E. JAMES TELFER (3rd S. xii. 451.) —I corresponded with Telfer, and published a sketch of his life, with two of his songs, in 1859, in the fourth volume of the Modern Scottish Minstrel. Telfer was, as stated by your correspondent, a man of strong literary tastes, and of no inconsiderable genius. He subsisted for many years on some twenty pounds a-year as teacher of an adventure school in Liddesdale. I have met several persons who were acquainted with himall of whom spoke most kindly of his talents and amiable disposition. Yet with the single exception of his dear friend, Mr. Robert White of Newcastle, a man of large-hearted benevolence, I believe few persons sought to mitigate to him the pressure of poverty. About ten years ago I originated an association in Scotland for the relief of literary Scotsmen in circumstances of indigence. Lord Chancellor Campbell became our president. Lord Brougham and the present Lord Bishop of London gave their hearty encouragement to the scheme; and Sir Archibald Alison, Bart., became one of our vice-presidents. There were about two hundred members, and our fund was fully 2001. per annum. But some petty differences occurred. I thought of allowing one of the dissentient parties to rule the institution in their own way, by retiring from the management. After rescinding the original purpose of the institution, they allowed it to fall to pieces. The remaining funds and the books of the society, which was termed the Scottish Literary Institute, are, I believe, in the hands of a lawyer or accountant in Glasgow. I have never ceased to regret the downfall of this institution. I do so now, when I think of the indigent condition of James Telfer. CHARLES ROGERS, LL.D. 2, Heath Terrace, Lewisham, S.E. LADY NAIRN (3rd S. xii. 451.)-MR. SIDNEY GILPIN refers to Lady Nairn. Beside the "Land o' the Leal," she was the author of "Caller Herrin'," "The Laird o' Cockpen," "My ain kind dearie O," "O weel's me on my ain man," "Kind Robin lo'es me," "Saw ye nae my Peggy," "Gude nicht and joy be wi' ye a'," "Cauld kail in Aberdeen," "He's owre the hills that I lo'e weel," "The Lass o' Gowrie," "There grows a bonnie brier bush," "John Tod," "Will ye no come back again?" "Jamie the Laird," "The Hundred Pipers," and other popular songs. I had the satisfaction of publishing a memoir of Lady Nairn in the Modern Scottish Minstrel (vol. i. 1855), from information supplied by her ladyship's relations and surviving friends. She was a gentlewoman of remarkable diffidence, and to the last refused to be known as a song-writer. She died in 1845, at the of seventy-nine. CHARLES ROGERS, LL.D. 2, Heath Terrace, Lewisham, S.E. age LINKUMDODDIE (3rd S. xi. 77, 491; xii. 361.)—— The communication of V. S. V. is an instance of how statements are intensified in the process of being repeated by one person after another, like V. S. V. the old story of the three black crows. asserts positively that the place is situated so and so. The learned historian of the county of Peebles most carefully guards himself by an "are said." No one, however, has brought forward an inhabitant of the place as the prototype of Willie Wastle, which, considering the date when Burns wrote, is hardly conceivable if the poet referred to a real person and a real place. The records are entirely silent as to the existence of such a place. It at the same time must not be passed without notice, that the succession to the lands of Polmood, to which it appears to belong, was an exciting subject some fifty years ago, when the idea of being sib to Polmood sent many a one to consult the lawyers. The fact is that Linkumdoddie, 'like so many names which are household words in Scotland, was a creation of the poet's brain, like the "Habies How" of Ramsay, about which so much ink has been spilt, to say nothing of the numerous attempts to give a local habitation and a name to the scenes of Sir Walter Scott's novels, about which a book, and an entertaining one, might be written. GEORGE VERE IRVING. WILLIE WASTLE (3rd S. xi. 77, 491; xii. 361.) Another Willie Wastle figures in the following rhyme, long familiar to Scottish children, sent by the governor of Home Castle, when summoned to surrender by Colonel Fenwick, commander of Cromwell's troops in 1650: · NOVEL VIEWS OF CREATION (3rd S. xii. 374.)— The theory propounded by your correspondent seems to bear a close resemblance to that which is maintained in M'Causland's Adam and the Adamite. May I be allowed to ask another question in connection with this subject? In St. Anselm's Cur Deus Homo (book i. chap. xviii. sect. 6) the following sentence occurs: "Si autem tota creatura simul facta est, et dies illi, in quibus Moyses istum mundum non simul factum esse videtur dicere, aliter sunt intelligendi, quam sicut videquomodo facti sint Angeli in illo perfecto numero." mus istos dies in quibus vivimus; intelligere neques The context sufficiently explains what is meant by the perfect number of the angels; but I should be glad if any of your readers could throw some light on the theory of simultaneous creation which is here propounded, and the non-literal acceptation of the Mosaic narrative which it seems to involve. RESUPINUS. MISERICORDIA (3rd S. xii. 461.)- MR. LLOYD wishes to know the origin of what he calls an "old English apophthegm 'Mercy is to be found Between the stirrup and the ground." I suppose that the source of the lines is the epitaph which Johnson quoted to Boswell from Camden's Remains. (Vide Croker's Boswell's Life of Johnson, c. lxxvi. p. 729) : — "Boswell. When a man is the aggressor, and by ill usage forces on a duel in which he is killed, have we not little ground to hope that he is gone to a state of happiness? "Johnson. Sir, we are not to judge determinately of the state in which a man leaves this life. He may in a moment have repented effectually, and, it is possible, may have been accepted of God. There is in Camden's Remains an epitaph upon a very wicked man, who was killed by a fall from his horse, in which he is supposed to say "Between the stirrup and the ground I mercy ask'd, I mercy found.'" Malone adds a foot-note: "In repeating this epitaph Johnson improved it. The original runs thus: "Al to-tare his a-tir that he to-tere might." William and the Werwolf, 1. 3884. That is, "he completely tare-in-pieces his attire, whatever of it he could tear-in-pieces." And, if this be not thought decisive enough as to the separation of the al from the to, here is another more decisive still "For hapnyt ony to slyd and fall, That is, "For, if any one had happened to slide Cambridge. "PERISH COMMERCE! LET THE CONSTITUTION. LIVE" (3rd S. ix. 453.)-These memorable words, long ascribed to Wm. Windham, but first pronounced by George Hardinge, the Welsh judge, sound very like the often-quoted "Périssent les colonies plutôt qu'un principe," and "Périsse Agrippine (1653); who may very possibly have l'univers, pourvu que je me venge," in Cyrano's taken the idea from Corneille's Rodogune (1648): "Tombe sur moi le ciel, pourvu que je me venge." P. A. L. SHELLEY'S "TALL FLOWER" (3rd S. xii. 466.)— I think the foxglove is not the flower alluded to. It blossoms in summer, and he enumerates only spring flowers. I should rather suppose him to mean the daffodil, or its congeners, the jonquil and narcissus. The daffodil is remarkable for holding wet, and scattering it when agitated by the wind. F. C. H. LITERARY PSEUDONYMS (3rd S. viii. 498.)-Has not your correspondent, W. CAREW HAZLITT, made a mistake in saying "Prefixed to Richard Grenaway's (which, by the way, is spelled Grenewey) translation of the Annales of Tacitus, 1598, edition of the Annales in my library. It is dedithere is an epistle signed A. B.'"? I have this cated in sufficiently laudatory terms "To the Right Honorable Robert Earle of Essex and Ewe." There is a short address to the reader by Grenewey, but no epistle. Bound up in the same volume with the Annales, there is "The Ende of Nero and Beginning of Galba. Fower Bookes of the Histories of Cornelius Tacitus. The Life of Agricola. The Second Edition, MDXCVIII." This translation was written by Sir Henry Saville, and first appeared in 1591. Sir Henry dedicates his work to Queen Elizabeth, and following the dedication is "A. B. to the Reader." This is no doubt the epistle referred to by your correspondent. Its energy and boldness of language quite prepare me to believe that "A. B." was the Earl of Essex. The importance of minute accuracy in "N. & Q." forms my excuse for this note. Dalkeith. J. S. G. "HISTORY OF HADDINGTON" (3rd S. x. 168.) This work appeared in 1844, in 8vo, with the following title-page : "The Lamp of Lothian; or, the History of Haddington, in connection with the Public Affairs of East Lothian and of Scotland, from the Earliest Records to the Present Period. By James Miller, Haddington: Printed and published by James Allan, and sold by Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh. 1844." J. S. G. MODERN ORIGIN OF SANSKRIT LITERATURE: AGE OF THE VALMIKI RÂMÂYANA (3rd S. xii. 444.) 1. In the very important copy of this work discovered by M. M. at Oxford, is the date A.D. 1433, given for it, described in the work itself as being of the Christian era; and if not, from what corresponding Indian era has it been taken? 2. Does the work referred to contain any other dates, and can it be made use of for verifying upwards of sixty historical dates given separately in the Bâl and Âdhbhutya, or the Adhyatma Râmâyana, both purporting to be derived from the great original work by Vâlmiki? 3. Are the births of the brothers Lava, the founder of the Bargujar dynasty of Lahor, and Kusa of Kussoor, that of the Kachchwâhâs of Kachchwâgar and Jaipur, separately accounted for, or are they described in it as being twins? 4. What account does it give of the name, parentage, and tribe, of the chief to whom it is dedicated, or of the writer by whom it was transcribed ? R. R. W. ELLIS. BARONETCY OF GIB (3rd S. xii. 274, 362, 421.) To obviate further unnecessary discussion, I beg to state the following facts, which I learned in Edinburgh the other day on the very best authority. The patent creating Henry Gib of Carriber (in Linlithgowshire) a baronet about 1635, has been long lost, and the dignity became dormant or extinct at his death without issue, about 1650. His soi-disant successor has made numerous inquiries regarding his descent and supposed relationship to Sir Henry, but has never presented his case publicly before the proper tribunal-the Court of the Sheriff of Chancery in Edinburgh. Even this step, though it were to result in proving collateral relationship to Sir Henry, would still be far from establishing a right to the dignity, which, in the absence of the patent, must be presumed to have been taken to heirs male of the body of the patentee. It is entirely on public grounds that I state these facts, having no personal knowledge of the claimant; but at present he has clearly not established his right to dub himself Baronet of Falkland." MR. IRVING (p. 421) has very strangely misled EQUES AURATUS regarding the obsolete mode of service before a jury. The old writ or "brieve" of inquest from the crown, with its attendant "retour by the jury, were abolished twenty years ago by the act 10 & 11 Vict. c. 47, and a claimant now presents a petition either to the sheriff of the county where his ancestor was domiciled, or (in certain specified cases) to the sheriff of Chancery, whose judgment supersedes the old procedure. (Seton, Scottish Heraldry, p. 304, note.) Mr. Seton's remarks on sham baronets are worth reading. ANGLO-SCOTUS. the late Thomas Crofton Croker's branch, are deduced from Edward, a younger son of Thomas Croker of Trevellas, in Cornwall, and his wife Margery Gyll. Now, the visitation of Cornwall of 1620 allows only two sons of this Thomas and Margery-John and Hugh; so that if they had a brother Edward, he must have been born after 1620. But Edward, said to have come to Ireland, had a son born about 1624, and a grandson born in 1653; so that he (Edward) could not have been born after 1620, the date of the visitation, which may be seen in the Harleian MS. 1142. The visitations are particular in containing all of the existing generation. It therefore will require strong evidence to support the above extraction of the family. It is so easy to set a graft on an old stock, that the point of divergence of branches is peculiarly open to suspicion. Many families who migrated to Ireland have been tacked to old English pedigrees without, I fear, any warrant. The Bernards, now represented by the Earl of Bandon, have been lately deduced by Sir Bernard Burke from a supposed very ancient and important and knightly family of Bernard of Acornbank, in Westmoreland, who, I verily believe, never existed. At least they are not noticed in Nicholson and Burns' History of that county, nor in any of the manuscripts in the British Museum which have been indexed by Mr. Sims,-nor, I may add, in Sir Bernard Burke's Armory. Acornbank was the seat of the Dalston family. C. D. HARFRA says, that in the case of the lady he mentioned, he said nothing about her having congestion of the brain." Certainly he did not use this precise form of words, but he told us (3rd S. xii. 178) that she was "troubled with blood to the head." Now really this is a distinction without a difference; for one knows it was not an irregularity in the circulation of blood through the bones, or other parts composing the human head, that could influence this lady's sight. It could be affected only by the blood-supply to the brain and eyes, and therefore HARFRA'S "blood to the head" and my "congestion of the brain" are really synonymous terms. SEEING IN THE DARK (3rd S. xii. 106, 471.)—— MR. WETHERELL quotes Isidore as if he were an authority on this subject of seeing in the dark. Now all that Isidore of Seville in his Origines had to do, was to give definitions of various words; and in the course of his work he explains the meaning of the word Nyctalopia, as used by writers on eye-diseases. He does not pretend to give any medical opinion of his own. The physiological views of ophthalmic writers anterior to the seventh century, when Isidore of Seville flourished, have of course no value whatever at the present day. OPHTHALMOSOPHOS. MR. GAY'S FABLES, WITH BEWICK'S WOODCUTS (3rd S. xii. 461.)-I have not the least doubt that the wood-cuts in the small volume of Gay's Fables, printed in 1806, are by Bewick, having been familiar with them at that date, when we used to read Gay's Fables as a school-book. The wood-blocks have, moreover, been wonderfully preserved, and done service in various editions, even so recently as 1834. For I have a small copy printed in that year for Longman and Co., and from early recollections I am sure of the identity of each one of the wood-cuts. I have also an edition of that favourite old book, The Looking-glass of the Mind, taken from Berquin's Ami des Enfans, which has also the original wood-cuts by Bewick. The engravings in both these works are very valuable, not only for their originality and spirited, though rude, execution, but for their exhibiting accurate delineations of the dress and habits of the latter part of the last century. F. C. II. INSCRIPTION AT BAKEWELL (3rd S. xii. 461.)— The passage of Juvenal referred to (x. 172, 3) is "Mors sola fatetur Quantula sint nominum corpuscula," and the words "sola fatetur" are probably those wanting to complete the first line of the inscription. The second line requires such a word as "perit," "death is swallowed up in piety," or perhaps "minor;" as, however small our mortal bodies may be, yet death, though subject to none, is yet overcome by, and so becomes less than piety. The writer having quoted one classical author, may have had in his mind another, and the "Victor jacet pietas" of Ovid (M. i. 149), would supply an ending to the epitaph in the word "jacet." Adopting Gifford's version of the passage from Juvenal, the whole may be paraphrased thus:: "Death, the great teacher, Death alone proclaims W. E. BUCKLEY. THE NAME OF SHEFFIELD (3rd S. ix. 409.) – I think W., the friend of your correspondent H. J., is likely to be correct in his assumption that the name of Sheffield is a corruption of the Danish "Skjev-Fjeld," signifying a "sloping hill or mountain." At Leeds, just on the outskirt of the town, there is, leading down from the locality of Woodhouse to Woodhouse Carr, a piece of ground which has been known as "Shay Field," for "time out of mind," as the saying runs. There are buildings there now, which may have given another. name to the place, but they are only of recent erection, and "Shay Field" is in everybody's mouth yet thereabouts. The field was a very long one, was an easy even slope from top to bottom, and was, in short, a smooth hill-side, needing more breath to get up than old people could well spare. The peculiar character of the ground is continued on both sides, and will be above a quarter of a mile in extent, forming a high knoll at one and another point, for a good deal of it remains grass land. "Shay Field the only enclosure about that was not strictly private property, as the congregation of pig-sties at the bottom sufficiently evidenced; hence the limited application of the local name. C. C. R. was PRAYING FOR HUSBANDS (3rd S. viii. 205.) — At least the tradition of this as an old custom may be inferred from the talk in some of the villages of North Yorkshire. The servant-girls will tell you how that once one of their number stipulated with a bargaining mistress at a statutehiring, that she should be allowed ten minutes every day at noon to go pray for a husband in. The following story is current in one quarter "Mrs. S-, who had lived as housekeeper with a Catholic family near York (names and places being specified) for many years, had engaged one servant who became an object of curiosity to the rest of the maids; for as regularly as noon came, she would leave off work and go to her chamber. By-and-by it was whispered about that their fellow-servant spent the time in praying for a husband. One day one of the men hid himself in a closet adjoining the devotee's room, and waited her arrival. At the usual time she came, and kneeling before her little framed picture of the Virgin and Child, began, and continued for a length of time: A husband! a husband! sweet Mary, a husband! Send him soon, an' he may be owt but a tailor'-ought but a tailor. 'Nowt [nothing] but a tailor!" the man at last shouted. She responded at once: 'Ho'd thee noise, little Jesus, an' let thee mother speak.' 'Nowt but a tailor!' as sharply replied the man again. owt but a tailor, owt but a tailor, but a tailor rather than nowt, good Lord."" I beg to share responsibility here with somebody-I don't care who. Nay, C. C. R. JEAN ETIENNE LIOTARD (3rd S. ix. 473.)—In reply to J.'s query, I cannot say "whether Liotard painted life-size portraits in oil while in England"; but I saw in his family in Amsterdam, a few years ago, a large room hung round with a considerable number of life-size crayons (pastel) by him, which were full of life: one amongst others in a Turkish costume-a portrait of himself. P. A. L. DORKING, SURREY (3rd S. xii. 461.) — I have the second edition of this work, published 1823, by John Timbs. D. D. H. |