Various

“ His opinion is certainly entitled to great respect: yet it may, nevertheless, be remarked, first that the instance given, supposing Marlowe not to be the author, would be cases of theft rather than imitation, and which, done on so large a scale, would scarcely be confined to the works of one writer; and, secondly, that in original passages there are instances of an independence and vigour of thought equal to the best things that Marlowe ever wrote—a circumstance not to be reconciled with the former supposition. ”

“ But for the obstinate effects of this impression, it is difficult to conceive how any one could miss the original invention of Shakspeare in the induction, and such scenes as that between Grumio and the tailor; the humour of which shines, even in the feeble reflection of the imitation, in striking contrast with those comic (?) scenes which are the undisputed invention of the author of the Taming of a Shrew.
The first passage I take is from Act IV. Sc. 3.
"Grumio. Thou hast fac'd many things?
"Tailor. I have.
"Gru. Face not me: thou hast brav'd many men; brave not me. ”

“ Relics of antiquity, in themselves most interesting and instructive, become doubly so when they have belonged to individuals whose deeds are chronicled in history. Who is there, "to dell forgetfulness a prey," who does not look with intense interest on objects connected with the "mighty victor, mighty lord," Edward the Third, the Black Prince, Henry VIII., the imperious Elizabeth, the ill-fated Mary of Scotland, or the unhappy Charles I.? ”

“ The Maltese at Valletta, a people singularly, and, as we should say, morbidly, addicted to the seeming enjoyment of the most horrid discords, on Good Friday Eve, have the custom of jangling the church bells with the utmost violence, in execration of the memory of Judas ”

“ In the tailor's sense, "things" may be "fac'd" and "men" may be "brav'd;" and, by means of this play, the tailor is entrapped into an answer. The imitator, having probably seen the play represented, has carried away the words, but by transposing them, and with the change of one expression—"men" for "things"—has lost the spirit: there is a pun no longer. He might have played upon "brav'd," but there he does not wait for the tailor's answer; and "fac'd," as he has it, can be understood but in one sense, and the tailor's admission becomes meaningless. The passage is as follows:—
"Saudre. ”

“ The Maltese, as is well known, are a very superstitious people. The employment of Judas candles would, no doubt, if properly explained, turn out to mean to imply execration against the memory of Judas, wherever they may be used. But in the expression Judas bell, the greatest conceivable amount of discord is that which is intended to be expressed. ”

“ And from the account of the origin of the riots by the Council of the Criminal Court of Athens, we learn, that "it is proved by the {358} investigation, that on March 23, 1847, Easter Day, a report was spread in the parish of the Church des incorporels, that the Jew, D. Pacifico, by paying the churchwarden of the church, succeeded in preventing the effigy of Judas from being burnt, which by annual custom was made and burnt in that parish on Easter Day." ”

“ Death-bed Superstition.—See Guy Mannering, ch. xxvii. and note upon it:—
"The popular idea that the protracted struggle between life and death is painfully prolonged by keeping the door of the apartment shut, was received as certain by the superstitious eld of Scotland."
In my country (West Gloucestershire) they throw open the windows at the moment of death.
The notion of the escape of the soul through an opening is probably only in part the origin of this superstition. It will not account for opening all the locks in the house. ”

“ I consider, therefore, that an exception must be made to the rule of using "An" before words beginning with a vowel in cases where the words are pronounced as if beginning with a consonant, as "one," "use," and its derivatives, "ubiquity," "unanimity," and some others which will no doubt occur to your readers. I should be glad to be informed if my opinion is correct; and I will only further observe, that the same remarks are applicable towards words beginning with "h." An horse sounds as bad as a hour ”

“ Finding my abilitie too little to make the meanest satisfaction of so great a principall as is due to so many favourable curtesies, I am bold to tende your Ladyship this unworthy interest, wherewithal I will put in good securitie, that as soone as time shall relieve the necessitie of my young invention, I will disburse my Muse to the uttermost mite of my power, to make some more acceptable composition with your bounty. ”

“ Vers l'est de cette Isle il y a une petite plaine au haut d'une montagne, qu'on appelle la Plaine des Caffres, où l'on trouve un gros oiseau bleu, dont la couleur est fort éclatante. Il ressemble à un pigeon ramier; il vole rarement, et toujours en rasant la terre, mais il marche avec une vitesse surprenante ”

“ They thought the soul, or the life, was tied up, and that the unloosing of any knot might help to get rid of the principle, as one may call it. For the same superstition prevailed in Scotland as to marriage (Dalyell, p. 302.) . Witches cast knots on a cord; and in a parish in Perthshire both parties, just before marriage, had every knot or tie about them loosened, though they immediately proceeded, in private, severally to tie them up again. And as to the period of childbirth, see the grand and interesting ballad in Walter Scott's Border Poems, vol. ”

“ A little before, in the same scene, Grumio says, "Master, if ever I said loose-bodied gown, sew me in the skirts of it, and beat me to death with a bottom of brown thread." I am almost tempted to ask if passages such as this be not evidence sufficient. In the Taming of a Shrew, with the variation of "sew me in a seam" for "sew me in the skirts of it," the passage is also to be found; but who can doubt the whole of this scene to be by Shakspeare, rather than by the author of such scenes, intended to be comic, as one referred to in my last communication (No. 15. p. 227., numbered 7.) ”

“ To this we may add, that the question at present pending between this country and Greece, so far as regards the claim of M. Pacifico, appears, from the papers laid before Parliament, to have had its origin in what Sir Edward Lyon states "to have been the custom in Athens for some years, to burn an effigy of Judas on Easter day." ”

“ God tempers the Wind, &c.—The French proverb, "A brebis tondue Dieu mesure le vent" (God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb) , will be found in Quitard's Dictionnaire étymologique, historique et anecdotique, des Proverbes, et des Locutions proverbiales de la Langue française, 8vo. Paris, 1842. Mons. Quitard adds the following explanation of the proverb:—"Dieu proportionne à nos forces les afflictions qu'il nous envoie." I have also found this proverb in Furetière's Dictionnaire universal de tous les Mots français, &c. ”

“ The Dod-aers of the Dutch is most probably a vulgar epithet of the Dutch sailors, expressive of its lumpish conformation and inactivity. Our sailors would possibly have substituted heavy-a——. I find the Dodo was also called the Monk-swan of St. Maurice's Island at the commencement of last century. The word Dronte is apparently neither Portugese nor Spanish, though in Connelly's Dictionary of the latter language we have—
"Dronte, cierto páxaro de Indias de alas muy cortas—an appellation given by some to the Dodo." ”

“ Again, in the Voyage de l'Arabie Heureuse par l'Océan Oriental et le Détroit de la Mer rouge, dans les Années 1708-10 (Paris, 1716, 12mo.) , the vessels visit both Mauritius and Bourbon, and some account of the then state of both islands is given. At the Mauritius, one of the captains relates that, foraging for provisions,—
"Toute notre chasse se borna à quelques pigeons rougeâtres, que nous tuâmes, et qui se laissent tellement approcher, qu'on peut les assommer à coup de pierres. ”

“ It is singular that Nares should have overlooked this obsolete term; and Mr. Halliwell, in his useful Glossarial Collections, seems misled by some similarity of sound, having noticed, perhaps, in Palsgrave, only the second occurrence of the word as before cited, "sheres for shepsters." He gives that author as authority for the explanation "shepster, a sheep-shearer" (Dict. of Archaic Words, in v.) . It has been shown, however, I believe, to have no more concern with a sheep than a ship.
The value of your periodical in eliciting the explanation of crabbed archaisms is highly to be commended. ”

“ Though Shakspeare was, in general, a most correct and careful writer, that he sometimes wrote hastily it would be vain to deny. In the third line of the foregoing extract, the meaning clearly is, "as which token of duty;" and it is the performance of this "token of duty" which Katharine hopes may "do him ease." The imitator, as usual, has caught something of the words of the original which he has laboured to reproduce at a most unusual sacrifice of grammar and sense ”

“ Cet oiseau ne vit que de fruits et de grains, et c'est un mets fort commun dans le pays. J'avois de la répugnance à suivre l'exemple de ceux qui en mangeoient; mais en ayant goûté par surprise, j'en trouvai la chair fort délicate. On peut dire que cet animal, qu'on abhorre naturellement, n'a rien de mauvais que la figure."
The Italics are mine; but they serve to show how the confusion has arisen. The writer speaks of the almost entire extinction of the land Turtles, which were formerly abundant ”

“ Quem Deus vult perdere, &c.—Prescot, in his History of the Conquest of Peru (vol. ii., p. 404., 8vo. ed.) , says, while remarking on the conduct of Gonzalo Pisaro, that it may be accounted for by "the insanity," as the Roman, or rather Grecian proverb calls it, "with which the gods afflict men when they design to ruin them." He quotes the Greek proverb from a fragment of Euripides, in his note ”

“ To cure Warts, the following charm is used:—A wedding-ring is procured, and the wart touched or pricked with a gooseberry thorn through the ring.
To cure Epilepsy, take three drops of sow's milk.
To cure Blisters in a cow's mouth, cut the blisters; then slit the upper part of the tail, insert a clove of garlic, and tie a piece of red cloth round the wound. ”

“ That the bird was extinct above 150 years ago I think we may conclude from the notices I have extracted from La Roque, and the letter of the Jesuit Brown. Mr. Strickland has done good service to the cause of natural science by his monograph of this very curious subject; and to him every particle of information must be acceptable: this must be my excuse for the almost nothing I have been able to contribute.
S.W. SINGER.
March 26. 1850.
THE WATCHING OF THE SEPULCHRE.
Inquired about by "T.W." (No. 20. p. 318.) , is a liturgical practice, which long was, and still is, observed in Holy Week. ”

“ A Living Dog better that a Dead Lion.—Can any of your readers inform me with whom the proverb originated: "A living dog is better than a dead lion?" F. Domin. Bannez (or Bannes) , in his defence of Cardinal Cajetan, after his death, against the attacks of Cardinal Catharinus and Melchior Canus (Comment. in prim. par. S. Thom. p. 450. ed. Duaci, 1614) , says ”

“ NOTES AND QUERIES may be procured by the Trade at noon on Friday: so that our country Subscribers ought to experience no difficulty in receiving it regularly. Many of the country Booksellers are probably not yet aware of this arrangement, which enables them to receive Copies in their Saturday parcels.
T.I. (Lincoln's Inn.) We fear there are mechanical difficulties (besides others) to prevent our adopting the suggestion of our Correspondent. ”

“ At any rate, I shall be glad to be informed of its origin,—if it be not lost in the mists of soldierly antiquity.
CANTAB.
REPLIES. THE DODO.
Mr. Strickland has justly observed that this subject "belongs rather to human history than to pure zoology." Though I have not seen Mr. Strickland's book, I venture to offer him a few suggestions, not as answers to his questions, but as slight aids towards the resolution of some of them.
Qu. 1. There can be no doubt about the discovery of Mauritius and Bourbon by the Portuguese ”

“ Arabic Numerals.—Your correspondent T.S.D.'s account of a supposed date upon the Church of St. Brelade, Jersey, brings to my mind a circumstance that once occurred to myself, which may, perhaps, be amusing to date-hunters. Some years ago I visited a farm-house in the north of England, whose owner had a taste for collecting curiosities of all sorts. Not the least valuable of his collection was a splendidly carved oak bedstead, which he considered of great antiquity. Its date, plainly marked upon the panels at the bottom of the front posts, was, he told me, 1111. ”

“ One more instance, and I have done. Shakspeare has imparted a dashing humorous character to this play, exemplified, among other peculiarities, by such rhyming of following words as—
"Haply to wive and thrive as least I may."
"We will have rings and things and fine array."
"With ruffs, and cuffs, and farthingales and things."
I quote these to show that the habit was Shakspeare's. In Act I. Sc. 1. occurs the passage—"that would thoroughly woo her, wed her, and bed her, and rid the house of her." ”

“ At the same time, though I do not believe Shakspeare's play to contain a line of any other writer, I think it extremely probable that we have it only in a revised form, and that, consequently, the play which Marlow imitated might not necessarily have been that fund of life and humour that we find it now.
SAMUEL HICKSON.
St. John's Wood, March 19. 1850.
PROVERBIAL SAYINGS AND THEIR ORIGINS—PLAGIARISMS AND PARALLEL PASSAGES.
"Ον οι Θεοι φιλουσιν αποθνησκει νεοσ." ”