Kitabı oku: «Notes and Queries, Number 04, November 24, 1849», sayfa 2
ADVERSARIA
[In our Prospectus we spoke of NOTES AND QUERIES becoming everybody's common-place book. The following very friendly letter from an unknown correspondent, G.J.K., urges us to carry out such an arrangement.
"Sir,—I beg leave to forward you a contribution for your 'NOTES AND QUERIES,' a periodical which is, I conceive, likely to do a vast deal of good by bringing literary men of all shades of opinion into closer juxtaposition than they have hitherto been.
"I would, however, suggest that in future numbers a space might be allotted for the reception of those articles (short of course), which students and literary men in general, transfer to their common-place books; such as notices of scarce or curious books, biographical or historical curiosities, remarks on ancient or obsolete customs, &c. &c. &c. Literary men are constantly meeting with such in the course of their reading, and how much better would it be if, instead of transferring them to a MS. book to be seen only by themselves, or perhaps a friend or two, they would forward them to a periodical, in which they might be enshrined in imperishable pica; to say nothing of the benefits such a course of proceeding would confer on those who might not have had the same facilities of gaining the information thus made public.
"In pursuance of this suggestion, I have forwarded the inclosed paper, and should be happy, from time to time, to contribute such gleanings from old authors, &c. as I might think worth preserving.
"G.J.K."
We readily comply with G.J.K.'s suggestion, and print, as the first of the series, his interesting communication, entitled:]
1. Writers of Notes on Fly-leaves, &c.
The Barberini Library at Rome contains a vast number of books covered with marginal notes by celebrated writers, such as Scaliger, Allatius, Holstentius, David Haeschel, Barbadori, and above all, Tasso, who has annotated with his own hand more than fifty volumes. Valery, in his Voyages en Italie, states that a Latin version of Plato is not only annotated by the hand of Tasso, but also by his father, Bernardo; a fact which sufficiently proves how deeply the language and philosophy of the Greek writers were studied in the family. The remarks upon the Divina Commedia, which, despite the opinion of Serassi, appear to be authentic, attest the profound study which, from his youth, Tasso had made of the great poets, and the lively admiration he displayed for their works. There is also in existence a copy of the Venice edition of the Divina Commedia (1477), with autograph notes by Bembo.
Christina of Sweden had quite a mania for writing in her books. In the library of the Roman College (at Rome) there are several books annotated by her, amongst others a Quintus Curtius, in which, as it would appear, she criticises very freely the conduct of Alexander. "He reasons falsely in this case," she writes on one page; and elsewhere, "I should have acted diametrically opposite; I should have pardoned;" and again, further on, "I should have exercised clemency;" an assertion, however, we may be permitted to doubt, when we consider what sort of clemency was exercised towards Monaldeschi. Upon the fly-leaf of a Seneca (Elzevir), she has written, "Adversus virtutem possunt calamitates damna et injuriæ quod adversus solem nebulæ possunt." The library of the Convent of the Holy Cross of Jerusalem at Rome, possesses a copy of the Bibliotheca Hispanu, in the first volume of which the same princess has written on the subject of a book relating to her conversion: "Chi l'ha scritta, non lo sa; chi lo sa, non l'ha mai scritta."
Lemontey has published some very curious Memoirs, which had been entirely written on the fly-leaves and margins of a missal by J. de Coligny, who died in 1686.
Racine, the French tragic poet, was also a great annotator of his books; the Bibliothèque National at Paris possesses a Euripides and Aristophanes from his library, the margins of which are covered with notes in Greek, Latin, and French.
The books which formerly belonged to La Monnoie are now recognizable by the anagram of his name. A Delio nomen, and also by some very curious notes on the fly-leaves and margins written in microscopic characters.
G.J.K.
ORIGIN OF WORD "GROG."
Mr. Vaux writes as follows:—Admiral Vernon was the first to require his men to drink their spirits mixed with water. In bad weather he was in the habit of walking the deck in a rough grogram cloak, and thence had obtained the nickname of Old Grog in the Service. This is, I believe, the origin of the name grog, applied originally to rum and water. I find the same story repeated in a quaint little book, called Pulleyn's Etymological Compendium.
[A.S. has communicated a similar explanation; and we are obliged to "An old LADY who reads for Pastime" for kindly furnishing us with a reference to a newly published American work, Lifts for the Lazy, where the origin of "Grog" is explained in the same manner.
The foregoing was already in type when we received the following agreeable version of the same story.]
ORIGIN OF WORD "GROG"—ANCIENT ALMS-BASINS
Mr. Editor,—As a sailor's son I beg to answer your correspondent LEGOUR'S query concerning the origin of the word "grog," so famous in the lips of our gallant tars. Jack loves to give a pet nickname to his favourite officers. The gallant Edward Vernon (a Westminster man by birth) was not exempted from the general rule. His gallantry and ardent devotion to his profession endeared him to the service, and some merry wags of the crew, in an idle humour, dubbed him "Old Grogham." Whilst in command of the West Indian station, and at the height of his popularity on account of his reduction of Porto Bello with six men-of-war only, he introduced the use of rum and water by the ship's company. When served out, the new beverage proved most palatable, and speedily grew into such favour, that it became as popular as the brave admiral himself, and in honour of him was surnamed by acclamation "Grog."
MACKENZIE WALCOTT, M.A.
P.S.—There are two other alms-basins in St. Margaret's worthy of note, besides those I mentioned in your last number. One has the inscription, "Live well, die never; die well and live ever. A.D. 1644 W.G." The other has the appropriate legend, "Hee that gives too the poore lends unto thee LORD." A third bears the Tudor rose in the centre. In an Inventory made about the early part of the 17th century, are mentioned "one Bason given by Mr. Bridges, of brasse." (The donor was a butcher in the parish.) "Item, one bason, given by Mr. Brugg, of brasse." On the second basin are the arms and crest of the Brewers' Company. Perhaps Mr. Brugg was a member of it. One Richard Bridges was a churchwarden, A.D. 1630-32.
M.W.
7. College Street. Nov. 17.
DYCE VERSUS WARBURTON AND COLLIER—AND SHAKSPEARE'S MSS
In Mr. Dyce's Remarks on Mr. J.P. Collier's and Mr. C. Knight's Editions of Shakspeare, pp. 115, 116, the following note occurs:—
"King Henry IV., Part Second, act iv. sc. iv.
"As humorous as winter, and as sudden
As flaws congealed in the spring of day."
"Alluding," says Warburton, "to the opinion of some philosophers, that the vapours being congealed in air by cold, (which is most intense towards the morning,) and being afterwards rarified and let loose by the warmth of the sun, occasion those sudden and impetuous guests of wind which are called flaws."—COLLIER.
"An interpretation altogether wrong, as the epithet here applied to 'flaws' might alone determine; 'congealed gusts of wind' being nowhere mentioned among the phenomena of nature except in Baron Munchausen's Travels. Edwards rightly explained 'flaws,' in the present passage, 'small blades of ice.' I have myself heard the word used to signify both thin cakes of ice and the bursting of those cakes."—DYCE.
Mr. Dyce may perhaps have heard the world floe (plural floes) applied to floating sheet-ice, as it is to be found so applied extensively in Captain Parry's Journal of his Second Voyage; but it remains to be shown whether such a term existed in Shakspeare's time. I think it did not, as after diligent search I have not met with it; and, if it did, and then had the same meaning, floating sheet-ice, how would it apply to the illustration of this passage?
That the uniform meaning of flaws in the poet's time was sudden gust of wind, and figuratively sudden gusts of passion, or fitful and impetuous action, is evident from the following passages:—
"Like a red morn, that ever yet betoken'd
Wreck to the seamen, tempest to the field,
Sorrow to shepherds, woe unto the birds,
Gust and foul flaws to herdsmen and to herds."
Venus and Adonis.
"Like a great sea-mark standing every flaw."
Coriolanus, act v. sc. iii.
"—patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw."
Hamlet, act v. sc. i.
"Like to the glorious sun's transparent beams
Do calm the fury of this mad-bred flaw."
3d Pt. Henry VI., act iii. sc. i.
"—these flaws and starts (impostors to true
fear)."
Macbeth, act iv. sc. iv.
"Falling in the flaws of her own youth, hath
blistered her report."
Meas. for Meas., act ii. sc. iii.
So far for the poet's acceptation of its meaning.
Thus also Lord Surrey:—
"And toss'd with storms, with flaws, with wind, with weather."
And Beaumont and Fletcher, in The Pilgrim:—
"What flaws, and whirles of weather,
Or rather storms, have been aloft these three days."
Shakspeare followed the popular meteorology of his time, as will appear from the following passage from a little ephemeris then very frequently reprinted:—
"De Repentinis Ventis.
"8. Typhon, Plinio, Vortex, aliis Turbo, et vibratus Ecnephias, de nube gelida (ut dictum est) abruptum aliquid sæpe numero secum voluit, ruinamque suam illo pondere aggravat: quem repentinum flatum à nube prope terram et mare depulsum, definuerunt quidam, ubi in gyros rotatur, et proxima (ut monuimus) verrit, suáque vi sursum raptat."—MIZALDUS, Ephemeridis Æris Perpetuus: seu Rustica tempestatum Astrologia, 12º Lutet. 1584.
I have sometimes thought that Shakspeare may have written:—
"As flaws congested in the spring of day."
It is an easy thing to have printed congealed for that word, and congest occurs in A Lover's Complaint. Still I think change unnecessary.
Has the assertion made in An Answer to Mr. Pope's Preface to Shakspeare, by a Strolling Player, 1729, respecting the destruction of the poet's MSS. papers, been ever verified? If that account is authentic, it will explain the singular dearth of all autograph remains of one who must have written so much. As the pamphlet is not common, I transcribe the essential passage:—
"How much it is to be lamented that Two large Chests full of this GREAT MAN'S loose papers and Manuscripts in the hands of an ignorant Baker of WARWICK (who married one of the descendants from Shakspear), were carelessly scattered and thrown about as Garret Lumber and Litter, to the particular knowledge of the late Sir William Bishop; till they were all consum'd in the general Fire and Destruction of that Town."
S.W.S.
Mickleham, Nov. 14. 1849.
[We cannot insert the interesting Query which our correspondent has forwarded on the subject of the disappearance of Shakespeare's MSS. without referring to the ingenious suggestion upon that subject so skilfully brought forward by the Rev. Joseph Hunter in his New Illustrations of the Life, Studies, and Writings of Shakspeare, vol. i. p. 105.:—"That the entire disappearance of all manuscripts of Shakspeare, so entire that no writing of his remains except his name, and only one letter ever addressed to him, is in some way connected with the religious turn which his posterity took, in whose eyes there would be much to be lamented in what they must, I fear, have considered a prostitution of the noble talents which had been given him."]
