THE FAMOUS CAMBRIDGE LATIN COMEDY,
Entitled Ignoramus, was first enacted. It originated in a dispute on the question of precedency, in 1611, when the Mayor, whose name was Thomas Smart, had seated himself in a superior place in the Guildhall of the town, in the presence of the Vice-Chancellor of the University, who asserted his right to the same; but the Mayor refused to resign the seat, till the Vice-Chancellor’s attendants forcibly ejected him. The dispute was laid before the Privy Council, who decided in favour of the Vice-Chancellor. But during the progress of the affair, the Recorder of Cambridge, named Brankyn, stoutly defended the Mayor and Corporation against the rights of the University. This it was that induced the author of the play, Geo. Ruggle, Fellow of Clare-Hall, to show him up, in the pedantic, crafty, pragmatical character of Ignoramus; and if lawyer Brankyn, it is said, had not actually set the dispute agoing, he greatly contributed to keep it alive. At this time King James had long been expected to visit Cambridge, who had a strong prejudice against lawyers, and a ruling passion to be thought the patron of literature. The circumstances suggested to Ruggle the propriety of exposing lawyer Brankyn before his Majesty, in the above character, and to render it the more forcible, he resolved to adopt the common-law forms, and the cant and barbarous phraseology of lawyers in the ordinary discourse. It was, therefore, necessary that he should make himself master of that dialect, in which almost the best amongst them were accustomed to write and even to discourse; a jargon, says Wilson, in his Memorabilia Cantabrigiæ, could not but be offensive to a classical car. He, therefore, took more than ordinary pains to acquaint himself with the technical terms of the profession, and to mark the abuse of them, of which he has admirably availed himself in the formation of the character of Ignoramus, who not only transacts business, but “woos in language of the Pleas and Bench.” The comedy was enacted before his Majesty by the members of the University, and he was so much delighted with, on dit, either the wit or absurdity, that he caused it to be played a second time, and once at Newmarket. During one of these representations, says Dr. Peckard, formerly Master of Magdalen College, in his Life of Mr. Farrer, “the King called out aloud, ‘Treason! Treason!’ The gentlemen about him being anxious to know what disturbed his Majesty, he said, ‘That the writer and performers had acted their parts so well, that he should die of laughter.’” It was during the performance of this play, according to Rapin and others, that James was first struck with the personal beauty of George Villiers, who afterwards became Duke of Buckingham, and supplanted Somerset in his favour. Thomas Gibbons, Esq. says, in his Collection, forming part of the Harleian MSS. in the British Museum, (No. 980, art. 173.) that “the comedy of Ignoramus, supposed to be by Mr. Ruggle, is but a translation of the Italian comedy of Baptista Porta, entitled Trapulario, as may be seen by the comedy itself, in Clare-hall Library, with Mr. Ruggle’s notes and alterations thereof.” A literary relique that is said to have now disappeared; but it is to be hoped, for the credit of a learned Society, that it is a mistake. Dyer in his Privileges of Cambridge (citing vol. ii. fol. 149 of Hare’s MSS.) gives the judgment of the Earl Marshal of England, which settled this famous controversy. The original document is extant in the Crown Office, in these words:—“I do set down, &c. that the Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge is to be taken in commission before the Mayor. King James, also, in the third of his raigne, by letters under the privy signett, commandeth the Lord Ellesmere, Chancellor of England,
TO PLACE THE VICE-CHANCELLOR BEFORE THE MAYOR,
in all commissions of the peace or otherwise, where public shew of degrees is to be made.”
AN OXONIAN AND A BISHOP,
Who had half a score of the softer sex to lisp “Papa,” not one of whom his lady was conjuror enough “to get off,” was one day accosted in Piccadilly by an old Oxford chum, with, “I hope I see your Lordship well.” “Pretty well, for a man who is daily smothered in petticoats, and has ten daughters and a wife to carve for,” was the reply.
BRIEF NOTICE OF THE BOAR’S HEAD CAROL, AS SUNG IN QUEEN’S COLLEGE, OXFORD, ON CHRISTMAS DAY.
“The earliest collection of Christmas carols supposed to have been published,” says Hone, in his Every-Day Book, “is only known from the last leaf of a volume, printed by Wynkyn Worde, in the year 1521. This precious scrap was picked up by Tom Hearne; Dr. Rawlinson purchased it at his decease in a volume of tracts, and bequeathed it to the Bodleian Library. There are two carols upon it: one, ‘a caroll of huntynge,’ is reprinted in the last edition of Juliana Berner’s ‘Boke of St. Alban’s;’ the other, ‘a caroll bringing in the boar’s head,’ is in Mr. Dibdin’s edition of “Ames,” with a copy of it as it is now sung in Queen’s College, Oxford, every Christmas Day. Dr. Bliss of Oxford also printed on a sheet, for private distribution, a few copies of this, and Anthony Wood’s version of it, with notices concerning the custom, from the handwriting of Wood and Dr. Rawlinson, in the Bodleian Library. Ritson, in his ill-tempered ‘Observations on Warton’s History of English Poetry,’ (1782, 4to., p. 37,) has a Christmas carol upon bringing up the boar’s head, from an ancient MS. in his possession, wholly different from Dr. Bliss’s. The ‘Bibliographical Miscellanies’ (Oxford, 1814, 4to.) contains seven carols from a collection in one volume, in the possession of Dr. Cotton, of Christ-Church College, Oxford, ‘imprynted at London, in the Poultry, by Richard Kele, dwelling at the longe shop vnder Saynt Myldrede’s Chyrche,’” probably between 1546 and 1552. “I had an opportunity of perusing this exceedingly curious volume (Mr. Hone,) which is supposed to be unique, and has since passed into the hands of Mr. Freeling.” “According to Aubrey’s MS., in the Coll. Ashmol. Mus., Oxford,” says a writer in the Morning Herald of the 25th of Dec., 1833, “before the last Civil Wars, in gentlemen’s houses, at Christmas, the first dish that was brought to the table was a boar’s head, with a lemon in his mouth. At Qeeun’s College, Oxford,” adds this writer, “they still retain this custom; the bearer of it brings it into the hall, singing, to an old tune, an old Latin rhyme, “Caput apri defero,” &c. “The carol, according to Hearne, Ames, Warton, and Ritson,” says Dr. Dibdin, in his edition of the second, is as follows:—