Minor Notes.
The Music in Middleton's Tragi-Comedy of the "Witch."—Joseph Ritson, in a letter addressed to J. C. Walker (July, 1797), printed in Pickering's edition of Ritson's Letters (vol. ii. p. 156.) has the following passage:—
"It may be to your purpose, at the same time, to know that the songs in Middleton's Witch, which appear also to have been introduced in Macbeth, beginning, 'Hecate, Hecate, come away,' and 'Black spirits and white,' have (as I am informed) been lately discovered in MS. with the complete harmony, as performed at the original representation of these plays. You will find the words in a note to the late editions of Shakspeare; and I shall, probably, one of these days, obtain a sight of the musick."
The MS. here mentioned was in the collection of the late Mr. J. Stafford Smith, one of the Organists of the Chapel Royal. At the sale of this gentleman's valuable library it passed, with many other treasures of a similar nature, into my possession, where it now remains.
Edward F. Rimbault.
Mr. Macaulay and Sir Archibald Alison in error.—How was it that Mr. Macaulay, in two editions of his History, placed the execution of Lord Russell on Tower Hill? Did it not take place in Lincoln's Inn Fields? And why does Sir A. Alison, in the volume of his History just published, speak of the children of Catherine of Arragon? and likewise inform us that Locke was expelled from Cambridge? Was he not expelled from the University of Oxford?
Abhba.
"Paid down upon the nail."—The origin of this phrase is thus stated in the Recollections of O'Keefe the dramatist:
"An ample piazza under the Exchange [in Limerick] was a thoroughfare: in the centre stood a pillar about four feet high, and upon it a circular plate of copper about three feet in diameter: this was called the nail, and on it was paid the earnest for any commercial bargains made; which was the origin of saying, 'Paid down upon the nail.'"
But perhaps the custom, of which Mr. O'Keefe speaks, was common to other ancient towns?
Abhba.
Corpulence a Crime.—Mr. Bruce has written, in his Classic and Historic Portraits, that the ancient Spartan paid as much attention to the rearing of men as the cattle dealers in modern England do to the breeding of cattle. They took charge of firmness and looseness of men's flesh; and regulated the degree of fatness to which it was lawful, in a free state, for any citizen to extend his body. Those who dared to grow too fat, or too soft for military exercise and the service of Sparta, were soundly whipped. In one particular instance, that of Nauclis, the son of Polytus, the offender was brought before the Ephori, and a meeting of the whole people of Sparta, at which his unlawful fatness was publicly exposed; and he was threatened with perpetual banishment if he did not bring his body within the regular Spartan compass, and give up his culpable mode of living; which was declared to be more worthy of an Ionian than a son of Lacedæmon.
W. W.
Curious Tender.—
"If any young clergyman, somewhat agreeable in person, and who has a small fortune independent, can be well recommended as to strictness of morals and good temper, firmly attached to the present happy establishment, and is willing to engage in the matrimonial estate with an agreeable young lady in whose power it is immediately to bestow a living of nearly 100l. per annum, in a very pleasant situation, with a good prospect of preferment,—any person whom this may suit may leave a line at the bar of the Union Coffee House in the Strand, directed to Z. Z., within three days of this advertisement. The utmost secrecy and honour may be depended upon."—London Chronicle, March, 1758.
E. H. A.
The Year 1854.—This year commenced and will terminate on a Sunday. In looking through the Almanac, it will be seen that there are five Sundays in five months of the year, viz. in January, April, July, October, and December; five Mondays in January, May, July, and October; five Tuesdays in January, May, August, and October; five Wednesdays in March, May, August, and November; five Thursdays, in March, June, August, and November; five Fridays in March, June, September, and December; five Saturdays in April, July, September, and December; and, lastly, fifty-three Sundays in the year.
The age of her Majesty the Queen is thirty-five, or seven times five; and the age of Prince Albert the same.
Last Christmas having fallen on the Sunday, I am reminded of the following lines:
"Lordings all of you I warn,
If the day that Christ was born
Fall upon a Sunday,
The winter shall be good I say,
But great winds aloft shall be;
The summer shall be fine and dry.
By kind skill, and without loss,
Through all lands there shall be peace.
Good time for all things to be done;
But he that stealeth shall be found soon.
What child that day born may be,
A great lord he shall live to be."
W. W.
Malta.
A Significant Hint.—The following lines were communicated to me by a friend some years ago, as having been written by a blacksmith of the village of Tideswell in Derbyshire; who, having often been reproved by the parson, or ridiculed by his neighbours, for drunkenness, placed them on the church door the day after the event they commemorate:
"Ye Tideswellites, can this be true,
Which Fame's loud trumpet brings;
That ye, to view the Cambrian Prince,
Forsook the King of Kings?
That when his rattling chariot wheels,
Proclaim'd his Highness near,
Ye trod upon each others' heels,
To leave the house of prayer.
Be wise next time, adopt this plan,
Lest ye be left i' th' lurch;
And place at th' end of th' town a man
To ask him into Church."
It is said that, on the occasion of the late Prince of Wales passing through Tideswell on a Sunday, a man was placed to give notice of his coming, and the parson and his flock rushed out to see him pass at full gallop.
E. P. Paling.
Chorley.