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Body and Esquire of the Body-Curious Marriage Cus

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tom-"The Prodigal Sou"- Latin Proverb-A Rectorship of Eighty-one Years Female Saint-Societas Albertorum-Theocritus ii. 2-Though lost to Sight, to Memory dear"-"Tom Tiddler's Ground "-Weaver's Art -Wives of Earls of Northumberland, 54. REPLIES:-Gun, 57-Convivial Songs, 58-"Es "and" En," 59-The Baltimore and "Old Mortality" Patersous, 60-Pennytersan, &c., Ib.- Francis, Earl of Bothwell-Mount Calvary Rhyme to "Widow"- Falls of Foyers and Glamma-Automaton Chess-Plaver D—— C—: "A Ride from Yarmouth to Wales". "Whinny Moor""She took the Cup," &c.- Lancashire Funeral Folk Lore Nicolas Hamel - The Hon. Catherine Southcote - The "Blue Laws of Connecticut"-The" Shan-Van Voght"First Book printed in Manchester Missale ad usum Sarum The Bookworm The Zodiac of DenderahJacob Böhme - Hair growing after Death, &c., 62. Notes on Books, &c.

Nates.

REAL PERSONS IN "THE FAERIE QUEEN.” We have seen that all is allegory in the first book of this poem. With it, however, allegory ceases, and we have only personifications; but it has been supposed that by these in general are meant real personages connected with the court of Elizabeth. Thus one critic sees in the staid sober Guyon, the hero of the second book, and his guide the sage Palmer, the fiery impetuous Lord of Essex and Archbishop Whitgift, but where the resemblance lies I confess I cannot discern. I may observe, by the way, that Guyon is the celebrated Guyon or Guy Earl of Warwick, the son of St. George, the Red-cross Knight of the preceding book-so renowned in romance for the temperance and moderation of his character. In fact, in the early books of the poem, we know to a certainty of but one real characterthe fair huntress Belphoebe, who, the poet assures us, was meant for the queen, as a most virtuous and beautiful lady."

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The queen, when the first part of the poem was published, was in her fifty-seventh year, and when we read the glowing description of the form and beauty of Belphoebe, we might be tempted to class Spenser among those adulators who gave her all the charms of youth when she was an old woman. But in so doing we should do him injustice. Spenser was born and lived in

London, as I think on the southern or Kentish side of the river. I have shown that the most probable year of his birth was the year 1551, and supposing him when fifteen or sixteen years of age to have often seen the queen, who was then we may say in her prime, riding as she always did through the streets of London, and probably in huntress' attire, to her favourite palace of Greenwich to hunt the deer in the park; or, supposing that he may at times have obtained admission into the park, and seen her bending her bow at the flying game, may not this sight have created Belphe be in his strong and susceptible imagination? Even when he had last seen her before his going to Ireland in 1580, the queen was only forty-seven, and her beauty was probably little impaired. Surely, then, the poet was not to blame for describing her in 1590 as he recollected her in her younger days.

I find, by the way, that there are persons who would sacrifice historic truth to false delicacy, and who blame me and others for vindicating the fair fame of the great queen from the foul aspersions of Dr. Lingard and his authorities, even though somewhat at the expense of her heroism. I am, however, not of them, and no literary act of mine ever gave me more sincere pleasure. The quotation from Randolph's letter in one of the replies I regard as of great importance, as it proves that in 1565 some of the best informed persons knew or believed that Elizabeth never would be a mother. The queen's words when she was informed of the birth of Mary's son are also very significant. As to her apparently serious intention of marrying Anjou when she was nearly fifty, it is easy of explanation.*

To proceed, then, Timias and Amoret were regarded by some critics as Sir Walter Raleigh and Elizabeth Trogmorton; but the latter was in no way akin to the queen, and Amoret is sister to Belpboebe. I am therefore inclined to see in this last Lettice Knollys, the queen's cousin, first married to Lord Essex, and then, to Elizabeth's great displeasure, to the Earl of Leicester, whom I take to be Timias, in whose name there may be an allusion to Leicester's motto, "Droyte et Loyall"; he is the squire of Prince Arthur, and the Dudley family were strongly attached to the house of Tudor; and his being wounded by the "josters," and secured and restored to health by Belphoebe, may allude to the ruin of his family at the accession of Mary, and its restoration by that of Elizabeth. By Sir Scudamore may be meant the Earl of Essex.

In Marinel of the Rich or Precious Strond Upton saw Lord Howard of Effingham, High Admiral of England, and in his treasures from

* See Fielding's Joseph Andrews, i. ch. 6; Marivaux, Le Paysan Parvenu, séconde partie, vers la fin.

wrecks, &c., the spoils of the Spanish Armada. I
view Marinel as a purely poetic creation, and trace
its origin thus: Spencer in his View, &c., makes
mention of one Arundel of the Strond in co.
Cork, who was formerly a great lord, but was
then much reduced; and I remember seeing
self the ruins of a castle close to the water on the
east side of Clonakilty Bay, named Arundel Castle,
which may have been his residence; and as he
may have derived much of his wealth from vessels
wrecked on his coast, the poet may have formed
from him his Marinel. His birth may be an
imitation of that of Achilles, but there were, and
perhaps still are, legends on the coast of Cork of
the union of mortals with nymphs of the sea.

the consent of their relatives, a night was appointed for the reite, when the friends met and a feast was prepared, of which all were hearty partakers. All arrangements were then made; the names of the parties were recorded in the church my-session-book, and were proclaimed on Sabbath. Invitations were then given to friends and neighbours, who in return generally sent a present to the bride by way of contribution to the feast; and in this way, hens, ducks, meal, butter, cheese, and even a fat sheep, would find their way to the bride's house. The bridegroom had to provide that important part of the feast, the jar of whisky; for tea was but little used sixty years ago. Gunpowder was purchased by the young men in order to salute the marriage party by the discharge of firearms.

On the morning of the wedding-day the wash

In the fifth book we come at last on real persons. Arthegal, for instance, and Britomart have hitherto been only the Ruggiero and Bradamante of the Furioso, but now he becomes Arthur Lording of the bride took place, and after her bath Grey, the poet's patron. The queen now is Mercilla, and Duessa the Queen of Scots, whose son, by the way, was so offended at it that he demanded the punishment of the poet. Blandamour and Paridel are now the two great northern earls who took up arms in her cause. Sir Burbon is Henry of Navarre, but in Gerioneo and Grantorto I only see personifications of Philip and the Spanish monarchy and of O'Neil and the native Irish.

Sir Calidore, the hero of the last book, is the gallant Sir Philip Sidney; Melibee and Pastorella, Sir F. Walsingham and his daughter, whom Sidney married; Colin Clout and his Lasse, the poet and his wife Elizabeth, another phase of whose character may, as I have hinted elsewhere, have given origin to Mirabella.

There may be other real persons in the poem, but I have not discovered them.

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she was dressed in her best clothes ready for the ceremony. The bride's party assembled in the house of her parents, where the wedding festivities were held, the bridegroom's party meeting them either at or near to the church or manse where the ceremony was celebrated. Pipers played before each party, and shots were fired as they passed along.

The ceremony being over, the two parties joined, and returned together to "the wedding-house with great joy. A barn had been cleared for dancing, where, after partaking of refreshments, the pipers and fiddlers began to play, and the young people immediately commenced dancing, at which they were very expert, having been previously trained to such exercise. The dancing was continued until the dinner was set down, when all the company took their places on either side of a long table. Grace having been said and a blessing asked by one of the aged men, they all fell-to at the good things provided for them, and the carvers made a round hand at the fowls, though some of them were not very expert at separating the joints. Indeed, I remember being at a wedding where there was a strong man who was called upon to carve; but, not coming upon the joints, he was somewhat puzzled how to divide the fowl into pieces; so he began to tell a story about a sailor who was set to carve, but could not do it. "Upon which," said the strong man, “I will tell you what the sailor did he took the fat hen in his hands, and grasping it firmly, tore it to pieces in an instant." And with this the strong man did the same; after which they let him eat his dinner in peace, and gave him no more fowls to carve.

After dinner the wedding company would set to dance in earnest: before dinner it had only been a little bit of exercise to whet their appetites. As the dance was open to all who chose to come and join it, young men and girls would travel

a long distance to be present at the marriage ball, to which they had admittance on condition of paying a small sum "for the floor." The ball and the whisky-drinking were kept up through the night until the next day's dawn, and it was always a late hour before the bride was put to bed. After this had been done with great ceremony by the bride's friends, and the bridegroom's own party had laid him by her side, the company gathered round them in their bed, and drank to their healths, to which the bride and bridegroom replied in the same manner, and the company then left them.

The next day the wedding company again assembled, and generally made a happy day of it with feasting, walking, dancing, and firing of guns and pistols until the evening, when they dispersed. Such was the fashion of marriages in Cantire early in the present century, but things are much altered now, although certain customs are still retained, especially those which relate to the dancing and the whisky. Now-a-days, when the wedding party have assembled to dinner, they will withdraw to the nearest public-house, where "the best men will go round the company with waiters, receiving an equal sum of money from each person-sometimes as much as three shillings or more from every guest. The whole of this sum is at once sunk in the purchase of whisky, and the natural consequence is that the diversions of the evening too often terminate in anything but harmony and goodwill.

BAPTISMAL CUSTOMS.-The baptism of infants was considered a very important ceremony in Cantire; for, in addition to its scriptural import, it was thought to be a temporal charm. Some people imagined that a child would not grow unless it were baptised, and all were of opinion that it was bad luck to have an unbaptised child in the house: hence it happened that parents and guardians brought infants to be baptised, however illegitimate the children might be, and however ignorant the parents might be. In cases of illegitimacy the church exacted a fine of the delinquents; and if the fine was not paid, means were used (sixty years ago, and prior to that) to send the fathers to the army and navy, in which way many of the Highlanders became soldiers and seamen hence arose the proverb, "An ill-got bairn often makes a good soldier.'

The Rev. Dr. Robertson, minister of the parish of Campbelton, and "collegiate" with Dr. Smith and Dr. McLeod, was very severe on those who could not answer his questions on these occasions. A man named McNeil once came to the old doctor, bringing his child for baptism; but not being able to answer the minister's questions, the doctor took a young man of the company aside and examined him, and made him to hold up the

child to get it baptised. This shamed McNeil and made him more careful for the future.

The

The celebration of the baptismal ceremony was attended with a great display of hospitality on the part of the parents, who invited their friends and neighbours to the christening feast. A jar of whisky having been provided, sponsors were chosen, whom they called "goistie" and "banna-goistie." care of the whiskey was entrusted to the "goistie," and the "banna-goistie" (or female gossip) had the charge of the eatables. The infant was then given up by the "bonheen" (ailing mother) to the company, and was carried away to church or to the minister's house; the company also took with them bread and cheese, and pins to be divided upon their return home among the young men and maids, that they might in dreams have a view of their future partners.

Sometimes the merry-making on these baptismal journeys was suffered to lead the company astray, and cause them to forget the cause and object of their undertaking. A baptismal company was once crossing the mountains between Largie and Saddell, and rested on the road to take a refreshment of bread and cheese and whisky; after which they proceeded on their way, and arrived at the manse. The minister had begun the ceremony, when they found that the infant was not present. "Where is the child?" was the question; and "Have you it ?" "Have you it ?" the females were asking one another, but no child could be found. At last, the one who had been carrying the child up to that place where they had stayed on their way for refreshment called to mind that she had laid it down among the heather, and had supposed that some one else must have picked it up and brought it to the manse; but as this was not the case, they had nothing for it but to retrace their steps to the place in question, which they did without delay, and found the child lying quite safely where it had been left on its bed of heather. Then they brought it back to the manse and had it baptised.

FUNERAL CUSTOMS.-Up to sixty years ago it was the custom in Cantire, when anyone had departed this life, for the friends of the deceased to provide the necessaries for the accommodation and refreshment of visitors. The corpse was wrapped in ollanach (woollen), and waked day and night until it was interred. A pan of salt was placed upon its breast, and it was stretched upon a platform, over which was erected a tent of white linen; within this tent candles were kept alight day and night until the time of burial. The neighbours gave up their work, and attended in the house. The Bible and other religious books were laid upon a table and perused by the luchd faire (watchers); devotional exercises were performed each night and morning; plenty of oaten

cakes and cheese, with whisky, was served at intervals, and something was said in praise of the deceased. "At intervals," continued my informant, "the relatives dropped a gentle tear."

When the time of the funeral came the company was served with bread and cheese and whisky. The coffin was then carried forth and put on "spakes," the people carrying it by turns to the grave; but before the funeral procession was out of sight, the straw in the bed on which the deceased had died was taken out and burnt.

Very often the procession was headed by a piper or by a person playing "The Land o' the Leal," or some other mournful air, on "the Lochaber trump" (i. e. the Jew's, or rather jaw's, harp). After the interment, and when the grave was neatly covered in with green sods, the nearest relative to the deceased thanked the company for their good attendance. Bread and cheese and whisky were then served round; after which the company departed to their own homes.

CUTHBERT BEDE.

SHAKSPERE'S DEATH: SOCIAL GENEALOGY.

Under date January 9, 1855, Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote (Passages from the English Note-Books of Nathaniel Hawthorne, i. 165-6): :"I dined at Mr. William Brown's (M.P.) last evening with a large party. Speaking of Shakespeare,

Mr. said that the Duke of Somerset, who is now nearly fourscore, told him that the father of John and Charles Kemble had made all possible research into the events of Shakespeare's life, and that he had found reason to believe that Shakespeare attended a certain revel at Stratford, and indulging too much in the conviviality of the occasion, he tumbled into a ditch on his way home, and died there! The Kemble patriarch was an aged man when he communicated this to the duke, and their ages linked to each other would extend back a good way, scarcely to the beginning of the last century however. If I mistake not, it was from the traditions of Stratford

that Kemble had learned the above. I do not remember ever to have seen it print-which is most singular."

Nor do I; and as it may be new to many others, I, in accordance with the motto of "N. & Q.," "make a note of it." It is very curious how little we know about Shakspere, and the more so considering the few lives intervening between his death and the date of his first biographer. Leigh Hunt (to whom most ideas of the kind were sure to occur, and form food for ingenious speculation) has happily worked out the thought contained in Hawthorne's note, in an article entitled Social Genealogy, from which the following extract may be acceptable :

"It is a curious and pleasant thing to consider, that a link of personal acquaintance can be traced up from the authors of our own times to those of Shakspeare, and to Shakspeare himself. Pope, when a child, prevailed on some friends to take him to a coffee-house which Dryden frequented. . Now such of us as

have shaken hands with a living poet might be able, perhaps, to reckon up a series of connecting shakes to the Desdemona. With some living poets it is certain. There very hand that wrote of Hamlet and of Falstaff and of

*

is Thomas Moore, for instance, who knew Sheridan. Sheridan knew Johnson, who was the friend of Savage, who knew Steele, who knew Pope. Pope was intimate with Congreve, and Congreve with Dryden. Dryden is said to have visited Milton. Milton is said to have known Davenant, and to have been saved by him from the revenge of the restored court in return for having saved Davenant from the revenge of the Commonwealth. But if the link between Dryden and Milton, and Milton and

Davenant is somewhat apocryphal, or rather dependent on from Pope, who had it from Betterton the actor, one of tradition (for Richardson, the painter, tells us the latter

Davenant's company), it may be carried at once from Dryden to Davenant, with whom he was unquestionably intimate. Davenant, then, knew Hobbes, who knew Bacon, who knew Ben Jonson, who was intimate with Beaumont and Fletcher, Chapman, Donne, Drayton, Camden, Selden, Clarendon, Sydney, Raleigh, and perhaps all the good men of Elizabeth's and James's time, the greatest of them all undoubtedly. Thus we have a link of beamy hands' from our own times up to Shakspeare.'

Leigh Hunt continues his "Social Genealogy" still further. For his continuation and the authorities (all set forth at length) for this "intelarticle itself, which has been recently reprinted lectual pedigree," I must refer the reader to the by Mr. Hotten in A Tale for a Chimney Corner, and other Essays, from the Indicator, 1819-21-a little volume edited by Mr. Edmund Ollier, whose biographical introduction is not only a very perfect bit of writing as to style, but is a delicious bit of appreciative criticism worthy its subject, and a pleasant picture of Leigh Hunt by one who knew him well.

Reverting to the main subject of this note, I may add that in "N. & Q." for March 2, 1861 (2nd S. xi. 162-3), are given two instances of the memory of two persons extending over 150 years, and linking together the reigns of Anne and George III. Doubtless many more could be

found if sought for.

Richmond, S.W.

S. R. TOWNSHEND MAYER.

CHRISTMAS MUMMERS AND PLOUGH-WITCHERS.

This journal being the chosen repository for the dates and particulars of popular customs, I may here state that the Christmas mummers came to my house in Huntingdonshire in the Christmas week of 1870-1, and acted the old masque of "George and the Dragon," with the characters of Bold Buonaparte, the Turkish Knight, Little Jack, Devildoubt, the Doctor, &c. The party of boys who performed this mummer's masque were costumed for the occasion, and went through the piece with much spirit. They had been orally taught the words, which differed but slightly

* Originally written and published in 1819.

from versions that I had previously heard in Worcestershire and elsewhere, and which have been recorded in former volumes of "N. & Q." I may also add that the Plough-witchers came as usual to my house on the evening of Plough Monday (Jan. 9), rattling their cans and asking for money.

CUTHBERT BEDE.

[Papers on Christmas Mummers will be found in 2nd S. x. 464, 465; xi. 271; xii. 487; 3rd S. i. 66; iv. 486.]

THE SIEGE OF BREDA: TOBACCO.-The siege of Breda was one of the most celebrated sieges of the seventeenth century, and is frequently mentioned by the old English dramatists. Spinola sat down before Breda on August 26, 1624, and the town did not surrender until July 1 in the following year. The besieged suffered incredible hardships. "Butter," says the historian Herman Hugo, "was sold for six florins a pound; a calf of seventeen days old for forty-eight; a hog, for one hundred and fifteen; and tobacco for one hundred florins the pound." This was after they had consumed most of the horses. A few days after, the narrator adds that " as much tobacco as in other places might have been had for ten florins was sold in Breda for twelve hundred." It appears that this tobacco was used as "physic, it being the only remedy they had against scurvy."

ML.

THE PRETENDER'S CORDIAL."To 3 quarts of brandy put one pint of juniper-berries; lb. of white sugar-candy, 2 pippins sliced and the juice of 2 lemons, the rinds pared; and put in three-pennyworth of saffron. Let this stand two or three days, shaking it twice a-day; then run it through a flannelbag for use." (From a MS. penes the Petty family.)

MOORLAND LAD.

EPITAPH AT WING CHURCH. As allusion has lately been made to the parish of Wing, co. Bucks, it may be interesting to note that in the nave of the church there is a curious brass-plate bearing the effigy of a man in a cloak kneeling, with a porter's staff under his feet, and a highcrowned hat, and a large key lying behind him. His hands are lifted up as if in prayer, and below is the following inscription:"Honest old Thomas Cotes, that sometimes was Porter at Ascott Hall, hath now (alas!) Left his key, lodge, fyre, friends, and all to have A room in heaven. This is that good man's grave. Reader, prepare for thine, for none can tell, But that you two may meet to-night.-Farewell. He died 20th November, 1648.

Set up at the appointment and charges of his Friend, GEO. HOVGHTON."

G. F. D. ADAM DE ORLETON.-Few ecclesiastical statesmen of the fourteenth century have been more thoroughly misunderstood and unfairly maligned than Adam de Orleton, whose memory has been made to suffer for a multitude of sins he assuredly Formerly a seat of the Dormers.

never committed in the flesh. Amongst them is the "fable" of his having written the Latin epistle mentioned by MR. TEW (4th S. vi. 560) to the keepers of Edward II. at Berkeley Castle, so often improperly quoted to his prejudice. If, indeed, there is one thing more certain than another in connection with Adam de Orleton, it is that he never wrote the letter in question, and equally untrue that he ever "owned it, but pretended his meaning was horribly mistaken." His policy at the time of Edward's incarceration was in direct contradiction to the assumption of his being the writer of those words, even to the extent of its being impossible he could have done so, as may be readily ascertained by those who feel interested in the subject. HENRY F. HOLT.

King's Road, Clapham Park.

GENERAL WOLFE AND THE 20TH FоOT.-In your First Series (vol. ii.) I observe some notices of General Wolfe, which remind me of what I understand was a fact that merits being recorded in "N. & Q." He entered the army as ensign in the 20th foot, which was and still is distinguished as Wolfe's regiment, not from any other official connection, but solely from his eminence and glorious death. Now it happened that the 20th was in garrison at St. Helena when Napoleon died, and the bearers of his body to the grave were grenadiers of Wolfe's regiment. G.

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WITCHCRAFT.-The following advertisement is worth a place in the old curiosity-shops of follies and fancies which the contributors of "N. & Q." are so plentifully furnishing for the edification of the future. It was issued with a number of the Spiritual Magazine in the year 1868- that is, in the nineteenth century of Christian civilization, and in what its sons claim as the most enlightened city of the most enlightened nation on the face of the earth. How far this theory is supported by the following document, I leave to the judgment of complacent Londoners:

"A Gentleman being bewitched by a hired Man-Witch in his immediate neighbourhood, hired and avowedly paid, during 35 years, a fixed sum of money yearly, by miscreants, for his criminal services, under the impunity secured to them by the Statute 9 George II. c. 5, for the crime of Witchcraft; would be glad to obtain the aid of any Medium who might be able, by Spectral Sight, by Clairvoyance, or by Trance, to afford such clue for

the identification in the sense of fact, of the said hired Man-Witch, in his personal and individual capacity for

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