Various

“ But in the fifty weeks appointed by Theseus, the very same love of a little display of erudition would lead Chaucer to choose the hebdomas lunæ, or lunar quarter, which the Athenian youth were wont to mark out by the celebration of a feast to Apollo on every seventh day of the moon. ”

“ And with respect to ε.'s second explanation of the meaning of "houre inequal," that expression also has been commented upon by Tyrwhitt, who attributes it to the well-known expansive duration of ancient hours, the length of which was regulated by that of the natural day at the several seasons of the year: hence an inequality always existed; except at the equinoxes, between hours before, and hours after, sunrise. This is undoubtedly the true explanation, since Chaucer was, at the time, referring to hours before and after sunrise upon the same day. ”

“ Bell, Publisher of "NOTES AND QUERIES," 186. Fleet Street.
Notices to Correspondents.
R. C. P. "Thal," "Theam," "Thealonia," in the Charter referred to, are certain rights of toll, of which the peculiarities will be found in any Law Dictionary; and "Infangethe" was the privilege of judging any thief within the fee.
S. P. Q. R. We must refer this correspondent also to a Law Dictionary for a full explanation of the terms Sergeant and Sergeantcy. A Deed Poll is plain at the top, and is so called to distinguish it from a Deed Indented, which is cut in and out at the top. ”

“ Dr. Parr, quoting Bergius, describes Absinthium as "a grateful stomachic;" and Absinthites as "a pleasant form of the wormwood." [7]
Is this therefore the article that Hamlet proposed to drink UP with his crocodile? So far from thinking so, I have ventured to coincide with Archdeacon Nares in favour of Steevens; for whether it be Malone's vinegar, or Mr. Singer's more comfortable stomachic, the challenge to drink either "in such a rant, is so inconsistent, and even ridiculous, that we must decide for the river, whether its name be exactly found or not." ”

“ But fifty weeks, if taken in their literal sense of 350 days, would be a most unmeaning interval for Theseus to fix upon,—it would almost require explanation as much as the difficulty itself: it is therefore much easier to suppose that Chaucer meant to imply the interval of a solar year. Why he should choose to express that interval by fifty, rather than by fifty-two, weeks, may be surmised in two ways: first, because the latter phrase would be unpoetical and unmanageable ”

“ Dr. Venner also recommends as an excellent stomachic,
"To drink mornings fasting, and sometimes also before dinner, a draught of wormwood-wine or beer:"
and we may gather the "atrocious bitterness" of the restorative, by the substitute he proposes: "or, for want of them," he continues:
"white wine or stale beer, wherein a few branches of wormwood have, for certain hours, been infused." ”

“ Overthroweth monasteries; through sloth and idleness soliciting religious men to be negligent in coming to Church, careless in preaching, and loose in their lives. In the marriage bed he soweth tares, treacheries, and lightness. With worldly men he persuadeth that he is nobody that is not rich, and therefore, bee it by hooke or by crooke, by right or wrong, he would have them get to be wealthy. ”

“ But when we find it repeated in an entirely different poem, and the same "observaunce to May" again associated with it, the conviction is forced upon us that it cannot be without some definite meaning.
This repetition occurs in the opening of the second book of Troilus and Creseide, where "the thridde" has not only "observaunce to May" again attributed to it, but also apparently some peculiar virtue in dreams. No sooner does Creseide behold Pandarus on the morning of the third of May, than "by the hond on hie, she tooke him fast," and tells him that she had thrice dreamed of him that night. ”

“ Whilst on the subject of dialectical expressions, I would mention an obsolete term which has by some singular chance recently been revived, and is actually in daily use throughout England in the railway vocabulary—I mean the verb "to shunt." Nothing is more common than to see announced, that at a certain station the parliamentary "shunts" to let the Express pass; or to hear the order—"shunt that truck," push it aside, off the main line. In the curious ballad put forth in 1550, called "John Nobody" (Strype's Life of Cranmer, App. p. 138.) ”

“ William Chilcott (Vol. iii., pp. 38. 73.) .—The few notes which follow are very much at the service of your correspondent. William Chilcott, M.A., was rector of St. George's, Exeter, where he died on May 30, 1711, at the age of forty-eight. The coat of arms on the tablet to his memory indicates that he married a Coplestone. His daughter Catherine died in August, 1695. The first edition of the Practical Treatise concerning Evil Thoughts was printed at Exeter in 1690, and was dedicated to his parishioners. ”

“ Singer of being "ignorant" of anything; but I venture to suggest that those young gentlemen of surpassing spirit, who ate crocodiles, drank UP eisell, and committed other anomalies against nature in honor of their mistresses, belonged decidedly to a period of time anterior to that of Shakspeare, and went quite out with the age of chivalry, of which Shakspeare saw scarcely even the fag end. Your lover of Shakspeare's time was quite another animal. ”

“ The position of various members of his family connecting Horace Walpole with the cabinet, the court, and the legislature, his own intercourse with those characters who became remarkable for brilliant social and intellectual qualities, and his reputation as a wit, a scholar, and a virtuoso, cannot fail, it is hoped, to render his memoirs equally amusing and instructive. ”

“ Old Tract on the Eucharist (Vol. iii., p. 169.) .—The author of the tract on the Eucharist, referred to by Abhba, was the Rev. John Patrick. The title of the tract, as given in the catalogues of Archbishop Wake, No. 22.; of Dr. Gee, No. 73.; and of Peck, No. 286., of the Discourses against Popery during the Reign of James II., is as follows:—
"A Full View of the Doctrines and Practices of the Ancient Church relating to the Eucharist, wholly different from those of the present Roman Church, and inconsistent with the Belief of Transubstantiation ”

“ Ache.
"Impatient to speak and not see" (Vol. ii., p. 490.) .—There is no doubt of the fine interpretation of your correspondent; but it is not illustrated by the Latin. Also, I apprehend, "indocilis pati" is not put for "indocilis patiendi." It is a common use of to—proud to be praised; angry to be so ill-treated.
It illustrates a line in Hotspur, the construction of which Warburton would have altered:
"I then, all smarting, and my wounds being cold,
To be so pestered," &c., i.e. at being.
May I mention a change in Troilus and Cressida which I have long entertained, but with doubt ”

“ Mr. Singer has merely substituted his "wormwood wine" for Malone's vinegar; and before he can make it as palatable to common sense, and Shakspeare's "logical correctness and nicety of expression," as it was to Creed and Shepley, he must get over the "stalking-horse," the drink UP, which stands in his way precisely as it did in that of Malone's more legitimate proposition. Mr. Singer overleaps the difficulty by a bare assertion that "to drink UP was commonly used for simply to drink." He has not produced any parallel case of proof, with the exception of one from Mr. ”

“ Blackstone's Commentaries and Table of Precedence.—The first edition of Blackstone was published at Oxford in 4to., in the year 1765; and the Table of Precedence, in the 12th chapter of the First Book, found in subsequent editions edited by Mr. Christian, does not occur in Blackstone's first edition. Can any of your readers, having access to good legal theories, inform me in which of Blackstone's own editions the Table of Precedence was first inserted? ”

“ To mich, for to skulk, to lurk, was an old English verb in common use in Shakspeare's time; and Malicho, or Malhecho, misdeed, he has borrowed from the Spanish. Many stray words of Spanish and Italian were then affectedly used in common conversation, as we have seen French used in more recent times. The Quarto spell the word Mallicho. Our ancestors were not particular in orthography, and often spelt according to the ear."
I have since looked at Mr. Collier's note to which he refers, and find that he interprets miching by stealing, which will not suit the context ”

“ Soul separates from the Body.—In Vol. ii., p. 506., is an allusion to an ancient superstition, that the human soul sometimes leaves the body of a sleeping person and takes another form; allow me to mention that I remember, some forty years ago, hearing a servant from Lincolnshire relate a story of two travellers who laid down by the road-side to rest, and one fell asleep. ”

“ The young man's father and mother, and also the young woman's father and mother, and sister Amy, desire that all gifts of the above nature due to them, may be returned on the same day; and will be thankful for all favour shown the young couple. ”

“ Singer's proposition? He says:
"In Thomas's Italian Dictionary, 1562, we have 'Assenzio, Eysell' [4] ; and Florio renders that word [Assenzio, not Eysell?] by 'wormwood.' What is meant, however, is wormwood wine, a nauseously bitter medicament then much in use."
When pressed by Lord Braybrooke ("Notes and Queries," Vol. ii., p. 286.) , who proved, by an extract from Pepys's Diary, that wormwood wine, so far from bearing out Mr. Singer's description, was, in fact, a fashionable luxury, probably not more nauseous than the pale ale so much in repute at the present day, Mr. ”

“ Allan of Darlington anticipates your correspondent C. W. B., and says, respecting Blount's explanation of "Canes lesos," "I can meet with no such word in this sense: why may it not be dogs that have received some hurt? læsos from lædo." Clancturam should be clausturam, and so it is given in the above edition, and explained "a tax for fencing."
S. W. Singer. ”

“ Knight's Pictorial Shakspeare. [10]
It will be time enough to decide which of us has run his head against "a stumbling-block of his own making," when Mr. Singer shall have found a probable solution of his difficulty "by a parallelism in the poet's pages." ”

“ When apples and pears are ripe.
I'll come to your wedding, without any bidding,
And," &c. &c. &c.
Does this mean that I will come without an invitation, or without a marriage-present? It will be observed that Parry is a Welsh name, and that bidding is a Welsh custom, as is shown by Mr. Spurrell (Vol. iii., p. 114.) . He has anticipated my intention of sending you a bidding-form, which has been lying upon my table for some weeks, but which I have not had time to transcribe ”

“ Snail-eating.—The practice of eating, if not of talking to, snails, seems not to be so unknown in this country as some of your readers might imagine. I was just now interrogating a village child in reference to the addresses to snails quoted under the head of "Folk Lore," Vol. ”

“ On the contrary, ε.'s ecliptic hours, if they ever existed at all (he has cited no authority) , would be obviously incompatible with the planetary disposition of the hours first referred to.
I shall now, in my turn, suggest explanations of the two new difficulties in Chaucer's text, to {202}which, at the conclusion of his note, ε. has drawn attention. ”

“ Ane Frier Paule, of Sylva, an eremit of muckle godliness who wond in a cell neir, by this kirk, whar daily he went to mattins, seid that for ten zeirs, one the eighth of September, tweye hours before day, he saw a light descende from heaven upon it, whelk he seyd was the B. V. wha their shawed harselfe one the feest of her birthe."
Then follows the evidence of Paule Renalduci, whose grandsire's grandsire saw the angels bring the house over the sea: also the evidence of Francis Prior, whose grandsire, a hunter, often saw it in the wood, and whose grandsire's grandsire had a house close by. ”

“ We have received a packet from Holland for our correspondent. Will he inform us how it may be forwarded to him?
M. or N. The meaning of these initials in our Catechism and Form of Matrimony is still involved in great obscurity. See "Notes and Queries," Vol. i., pp. 415. 476.; Vol. ii., p. 61.
De Navorscher. Mr. Nult is the London Agent for the supply of our Dutch ally, the yearly subscription to which is about Ten Shillings. ”

“ Willem de Water, in his Adelijke Zeeland, written in the seventeenth century, says that in his youth he knew a Witte van Haemstede of this family, one of whose sons became pastor of the Dutch congregation in London.—Navorscher, Jan. 1851, p. 17.
J. Bruckner—Dutch Church in Norwich.—In the Gentleman's Magazine for 1804 is a short memoir of the Rev. J. Bruckner. He was born in the island of Cadsand, completed his studies at Leyden, where he enjoyed the society of Hemsterhuis, Valckenaer, and the elder Schultens. ”

“ Miching malicho (Vol. iii., p. 3.) .—Your correspondent Mr. Collier is probably not aware that his suggestion respecting the meaning of Malicho had been anticipated upwards of twenty years since. In the unpretending edition of Shakspeare by another of your correspondents, Mr. Singer, printed in 1825, I find the following note:—
"Miching malicho is lurking mischief, or evil doing. ”

“ I wish to know, first, who was the anonymous author of these letters; and, secondly, in what collection of manuscripts this "Dialogue" is to be found.
μ.
Ballad Editing.—The "Outlandish Knight" (Vol. iii.,p. 49.) .—I was exceedingly glad to see Mr. F. Sheldon's "valuable contribution to our stock of ballad literature" in the hands of Mr. Rimbault, and thought the treatment it received no better than it deserved. Blackwood, May, 1847, reviewed Mr. Sheldon's book, and pointed out several instances of his "godfathership;" ”

“ Corbington, priest of the Companie of Iesus in the zeir MDCXXXV., have treulie translated the premisses out of the Latin story hanged up in the seid kirk."
S. Smirke.
FOLK LORE.
"Nettle in Dock out" (Vol. iii., p. 133.) .—If your correspondent will refer to The Literary Gazette, March 24, 1849, No. 1679., he will find that I gave precisely the same explanation of that obscure passage of Chaucer's Troilus and Creseide, lib. iv., in a paper which I contributed to the British Archæological Association. ”