Replies to Minor Queries.
Waterloo (Vol. vii., p. 82.).—P. C. S. S. conceives that it may be interesting to Philobiblion to learn that the greatest man in the world was not ignorant of the passage in Strada regarding Waterloo, to which Philobiblion refers. From a diary kept for some years, it appears that on Saturday, the 30th of October, 1843, P. C. S. S., who was then on a visit at Walmer Castle, had the pleasure of directing the Duke of Wellington's attention to the passage in question, as translated by Du Ryer (Paris, 1665). He well remembers that the Duke seemed to be greatly struck with it; that he more than once referred to it, in subsequent conversations; and that on the following day he requested P. C. S. S. to furnish him with a transcript, which he doubts not might still be found among the Duke's papers.
P. C. S. S.
Your correspondent Philobiblion has been led into a double error by a similarity of name. The pagus Waterloeus mentioned by Strada is the French village of Wattrelo, in the modern Département du Nord, about six miles to the northeast of Lille.
J. S.
Norwich.
Irish Peerages (Vol. vi., p. 604.).—The book alluded to by D. X. as professing to give pedigrees of ennobled Irish families, may be the contemptible Letters to George IV., by Captain Rock, a miserable attempt at a continuation of Moore's Memoirs of that mystic personage. Some half of the former book contains libellous notices of the "low origin" of the Irish nobility. Can your correspondent refer me to the play in which there is some sneer that "the housemaid is cousin to an Irish peer?"
H.
Martha Blount (Vol. vii., p. 38.).—An engraving of this lady, from "an original picture, in the collection of Michael Blount, Esq., at Maple-Darham," is prefixed to the tenth volume of Pope's Works by Bowles, 1806.
W. A.
In reply to Mr. A. F. Westmacott (Vol. vii., p. 38.), I have, in my collection of engraved portraits, one of the subject of his inquiry, "Martha Blount." It is in stipple, by Picart, after a picture by Gardner. I have no idea the portrait is rare, and think your correspondent may easily procure it among the printsellers in London.
J. Burton.
Quotations wanted (Vol. vii., p. 40.).—Bacon, in his Essay "Of Studies," has this sentence:
"And if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not."
which is perhaps the reference Miss Edgeworth intended.
"A world without a sun," is from Campbell's Pleasures of Hope, Part II. line 24.:
"And say, without our hopes, without our fears,
Without the home that plighted love endears,
Without the smile from partial beauty won,
Oh! what were man?—a world without a sun."
I beg to add a parallel from Burns:
"What is life, when wanting love?
Night without a morning:
Love's the cloudless summer sun,
Nature gay adorning."
See the song beginning:
"Thine am I, my faithful fair."
Arthur H. Bather.
East Sheen, Surrey.
Pepys's Morena (Vol. vi., pp. 342. 373.).—In the note on this word in the last edition of the Diary, it is stated that it may be read either "Morma" or "Morena." There is little doubt but the latter is the correct reading. "Morena" is good Portuguese for a brunette, and may have been used by Pepys as a term of endearment for Miss Dickens, like the "Colleen dhas dhun" of the Irish, which has much the same meaning. The marriage of the king to Catherine of Braganza in the previous year would have caused her language to be more studied at this time, especially by persons about the court. Morma has no meaning whatever.
J. S. Warden.
Goldsmiths' Year-marks (Vol. vi., p. 604.; Vol. vii., p. 90.).—I observe that, a few weeks ago, in the "N. & Q.," one of your correspondents made inquiries respecting the publication of my paper on plate-marks, which was read at the Bristol meeting of the Archæological Institute.
In reply, I beg to inform him that he will find, in the last two Numbers of the Journal of the Institute, the first and second parts of the paper, and that the concluding portion of it, and I hope also the table of annual letters, will appear in the forthcoming Number. Should it not be possible to get the table in a fit state for printing in that Number, it will appear in the next; and the whole subject of the assay marks of British plate will then be complete.
Octavius Morgan.
The Friars.
Turner's View of Lambeth Palace (Vol. vii., pp. 15. 89.).—In reply to your correspondent L. E. X., respecting Mr. Turner's picture of Lambeth Palace (which is in water-colours), I beg leave to say that it is in the possession of a lady residing in Bristol, to whose father it was given by the artist after its exhibition at Somerset House, and it has never been in any other hands. The same lady has also a small portrait of Mr. Turner, done by himself when visiting her family about the year 1791 or 1792: further particulars respecting these pictures (if desired) may be known by a line addressed to Miss N——, 8. St. James' Square, Bristol.
Anon.
J. H. A., after referring to the exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1791, by Mr. Turner, of "King John's Palace, Eltham" (No. 494.), and "Sweakley, near Uxbridge" (No. 560.), adds:
"In the horizon of art (strange to say, and yet to be explained!) this luminary glows no more till 1808, when he had 'on the line' (?) several views of Fonthill, as well as 'The Tenth Plague of Egypt.'"
A reference to the catalogues of the Royal Academy exhibitions will prove that Mr. Turner's name appears as an exhibitor there every year between 1790 and 1850, excepting the years 1821, 1824, and 1848. Several views of Fonthill Abbey, and "The Fifth (not the Tenth) Plague of Egypt," were exhibited in 1800, and "The Tenth Plague of Egypt" in 1802.
G. B.
"For God will be your King to-day" (Vol. vii., p. 67.).—In reply to your querist H. A. S. with respect to the above line, I believe that it belongs not to Somersetshire, but to Ireland; not to Monmouth's rebellion, but to the civil wars of 1690.
It is the closing couplet of a stanza in the popular ballad on the "Battle of the Boyne."
A very perfect copy of this ballad will be found in Wilde's Beauties of the Boyne, p. 271., beginning with—
"July the first, of a morning clear,
One thousand six hundred and ninety,
King William did his men prepare—
Of thousands he had thirty,—
To fight King James and all his host,
Encamp'd near the Boyne water," &c.
The passage from which the lines in question are taken is as follows:
"When that King William he observed,
The brave Duke Schomberg falling,
He rein'd his horse with a heavy heart,
On the Enniskilleners calling.
"'What will you do for me, brave boys?
See yonder men retreating;
Our enemies encouraged are,
And English drums are beating.'
"He says, 'My boys feel no dismay,
At the losing of one commander,
For God shall be our King this day,
And I'll be general under.'"
W. W. E. T.
66. Warwick Square, Belgravia.
The lines here referred to occur in the old ballad of Boyne Water, some fragments of which are given in Duffy's Ballad Poetry of Ireland, 5th edition, p. 248. They are supposed to have been spoken by William III. on the death of the Duke Schomberg.
"Both horse and foot they marched on, intending them to batter,
But the brave Duke Schomberg he was shot, as he crossed over the water.
When that King William he observed the brave Duke Schomberg falling,
He rein'd his horse, with a heavy heart, on the Enniskilleners calling:
'What will you do for me, brave boys? See yonder men retreating;
Our enemies encouraged are, and English drums are beating.'
He says, 'My boys, feel no dismay at the losing of one commander,
For God shall be our King this day, and I'll be general under.'"
The lines quoted by your correspondent also occur in the more modern song of The Battle of the Boyne, which may be found at p. 144 of Mr. Duffy's work.
Thompson Cooper.
Cambridge.
[We are indebted to many other correspondents for similar Replies to this Query.]
Jennings Family (Vol. vii., p. 95.).—I am much obliged to Percuriosus for his reply to my Query. The William Jennings, who was Sheriff of Cornwall in 1678, an admiral, and knighted by King James II. (see Le Neve's Knights, Harleian MS. 5801.), was most probably descended from the Yorkshire family of that name, his escutcheon being the same. The Francis who married Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Spoure of Trebartha, was descended from the Shropshire family, whose arms were—Ermine, a lion rampant, gules quartered with those of Jay, as recorded in the Visitation by Henry, the son of Francis. This Francis died about 1610-11. His will (the executor being Henry Spoure) was proved at Doctors' Commons in 1611. But what I particularly wanted to ascertain was, whether Rowland, who is the first that occurs in the Cornish Visitation, was the first who settled in Cornwall. I have inquired at the Heralds' College, but can gain no further information than that to be found in the Visitations of Salop and Cornwall in the British Museum. Percuriosus would gratify my curiosity, if he would kindly inform me where the Spoure MSS. are to be seen. They are not to be found in the British Museum. I have always thought that they were in the hands of some member of the Rodd family, whose ancestor (a Life Guardsman) was about to be married to the heiress of all the Spoures, but she, dying before the marriage, left him all her estates, Trebartha among the rest which is in the possession of the family to this day.
S. Jennings-G.
P. S.—I inclose my card, in order that Percuriosus (who evidently knows something of the family) may communicate personally or by letter. I think that I might possibly be able to give him some information in return for his kindness.
The Furze or Gorse in Scandinavia (Vol. vi., pp. 127. 377.).—Henfrey, in his Vegetation of Europe, states that the furze (Ulex Europæus) occurs, but not abundantly, in the south-western parts of the Scandinavian peninsula. It is well known that in Central Germany it is a greenhouse plant.
Seleucus.
Mistletoe (Vol. ii., p. 418.; Vol. iii., pp. 192. 226. 396. 462.).—There is in the parish of Staveley, Derbyshire, a solitary mansion called the Hagg, erected by Sir Peter Frescheville, in what was at that time a park of considerable extent, for a hunting lodge, when age and infirmity prevented him from otherwise enjoying the pleasures of the chase. In one of Colepeper's MSS. at the British Museum, there is the following curious notice of this house:
"This is the Parke House which Sir Peter Frescheville, in his will, 16th March, 1632, calls my new Lodge in Staveley Parke. Heare my Lord Frescheville did live, and heare growes the famous mistleto tree, the only oake in England that bears mistleto, which florished at my deare Wife's birth, who was born heare."
I presume it is the same which is referred to in the following letter addressed by the Countess of Danby to Mrs. Colepeper; it is without date, but was written between 1663 and 1682:
"Dear Cosen.—Pray if you have any of the miselto of yor father's oke, oblidge me so far as to send sum of it to
Yor most affectionat servant, Bridget Danby."
The oak tree still exists, and in 1803 it contained mistletoe, but there is none to be seen now. About a quarter of a mile from this locality I observed the mistletoe in a large crab-tree, and I recently found it in a venerable yew of many centuries' growth near Sheffield.
W. S. (Sheffield.)
Inscription on a Dagger (Vol. vii., p. 40.).—These lines form a Dutch proverb, and, if thus written, rhyme:
"Die een peninck wint ende behovt
Die macht verteren als hi wort owt.
Had ick dat bedocht in min ionge dagen
Dorst ick het in min ovtheit niel beklagen."
Which being interpreted inform us that, He who gains a penny, and saves it, may live on it when he becomes old. Had I minded this in my youthful days, I should not have to complain in my old age.
J. S.
Norwich.
Steevens (Vol. ii., p. 476.; Vol. iii., p. 230.; Vol. vi., pp. 412. 531.).—Steevens's will contains no mention of any portrait of himself, nor any other except his picture of "Mr. Garrick and Mrs. Cibber, in the characters of Jaffier and Belvidera, painted by Zottanij," which he bequeaths to George Keate, Esq. He gives to Miss Charlotte Collins of Graffham, near Midhurst, daughter of the late Christopher and Margaret Collins of Midhurst, 500l. To his cousin Mary Collinson (late Mary Steevens), wife of William Collinson of Narrow Street, Ratcliffe Cross, Middlesex, 300l. for a ring (so in my copy). The residue of his property he gives to his dearest cousin Elizabeth Steevens of Poplar, spinster, and appoints her sole executrix of his will. A copy of the will can be met with in the ninth volume of the Monthly Mirror for 1800.
W. S. (Sheffield.)
"Life is like a Game of Tables," &c. (Vol. vii., p. 40.).—The sentiment is very possibly "from Jeremy Taylor," but it is not his own. It occurs in Terence's Adelphi and Plato's Commonwealth.
A. A. D.