"And yet, Dorastus, shame not at thy shepheard's weede: the heavenly godes have sometime earthly thoughtes. Neptune became a ram, Jupiter a bul, Apollo a shepheard: they Gods, and yet in love; and thou a man, appointed to love."
E. L. N.
Inscribed Alms-dish.—There is an alms-dish (?)
in the possession of a clergyman near Rotherham, in this county, with the following inscription:—
"VREEST . GODT . ONDERHOVEDT . SYN . GEBOEDT . ANNO . 1634."
[Fear God (and?) keep his commandments.]
Having so lately been so justly reproved by your correspondent, Mr. Janus Dousa, for judging of Vondel's Lucifer by an apparently unjust review rather than by perusal,—and his beautiful chorus having so fully "established his case,"—I am rather shy of making any remarks upon this inscription: otherwise I would venture (errors excepted) to observe that there may be a mistake in the position of the last three letters of the third word.
If Mr. Dousa would kindly inform a very imperfect Dutch scholar whether this sentence is intended as a quotation from Ecclesiastes xii., 13th verse,—
"Vreest Godt ende hout sÿne geboden;"
or whether the third word is from the verb "onder houden,"—as looks probable, I shall be greatly obliged to him. The Bible to which I refer is dated 1644.