Various

“ In Devonshire the black cherry-tree, which grows to a large size in that county, is called the mazer-tree. From this circumstance I conjecture that this wood has been used there in former times for bowls and drinking-cups as a substitute for maple. That the original word, mazer, should have been retained, is not to be wondered at. It is known that when the mazer bowl was made of silver, the old name was retained. ”

“ ON THE WORD "PRENZIE" IN "MEASURE FOR MEASURE."
(Vol. iii., p. 401.)
I have read with attention the argument of your correspondent LEGES on the passage in Measure for Measure, in which the word "prenzie" occurs; and to much that he advances I should, like the modest orator who followed Mr. Burke, be contented to say "ditto." Nevertheless, as I cannot agree with him altogether, I beg permission to make a few remarks upon the question. The extent of my agreement with your correspondent will be shown in stating, that I think neither "priestly," "princely," nor "precise" to be the true word. ”

“ In what parish of each of these places, including Norwich, was the mint situated?
And now let me add a sentence or two respecting the compiler of the above-named chronicle, which I am induced to do, as his name is closely connected with that of one of the most celebrated controversial writers of the Augustan age of Anne and George I., the friend of Whiston, of Newton, and of Hoadley, and the subject of Pope's sarcastic allusion:
"We nobly take the high priori road,
And reason downwards till we doubt of God." ”

“ That the law has regarded them as irregular, is evident from the fact, that when in 1812 an act was passed "for the better regulating and preserving parish and other registers of births, baptisms, marriages, and burials in England," the 146th chap. of the same distinctly declares, that when a baptism is performed by any other than the licensed minister of the parish, the certificate of its performance must state that it was "according to the rites of the United Church of England and Ireland." ”

“ We disagree, however, in the measure of our dislike; for of the three suggested corrections, "princely" is, to my mind, by far the best, and "precise," beyond all measure, the worst. Indeed, but that Mr. Knight has adopted the latter term, as well as Tieck, I should have regarded it as an instance of the difficulty in the way of the best qualified Germans of understanding the niceties of English meaning, or of feeling how far license might be tolerated in English versification. ”

“ This beautiful and unique edition of Shakspeare will be produced under the immediate and auspicious encouragement of the Most Noble the Marquis of Lansdowne.
It is anticipated that its triumph as a Specimen of the Art of Printing will only be exceeded by the facility and clearness which the new arrangement of the text will afford in reading the works of "the mightiest of intellectual painters." Its portability will render it as available for travelling, as its beauty will render it an ornament to the drawing-room.
Every care has been taken to render the text the most perfect yet produced. ”

“ The Coptic language is not an inflected one; and it has very few affixes. There are many prefixes to its nouns and verbs, which before the former are articles or demonstrative pronouns. Between these prefixes and the noun or verb, pronominal infixes are introduced, by which possession is denoted in the case of a noun, and the subject in that of a verb. Thus, ran is "a name;" pi-ran, "the name;" pe-v-ran, "his name;" i, is the verbal root, "come;" a, the prefix of the past tense; and a-v-i, "he came." Some nouns take affixes, as jo-v, "his head." ”

“ The conditions required, as your correspondent well states, are "that the word adopted shall be (1) suitable to the reputed character of Angelo; (2) an appropriate epithet to the word 'guards;' (3) of the proper metre in both places; and (4) similar in appearance to the word 'prenzie.'" Now, it does not appear to have been considered that this similarity was to be sought in manuscript, and not in print; or, if considered, that much more radical errors arise from illegible manuscripts than the critics have allowed for. ”

“ More fatal, however, is the destruction of the measure. Both instances go beyond all bounds of license. And though we may pass over the error in a critic so eminent even as Tieck, we need feel no compunction at exposing "earless on high" an Englishman who has pilloried so often and so mercilessly others for the same offence.
While, however, LEGES has shown good cause against the adoption of either of the above epithets, it does not appear to me that he has succeeded in establishing a case in favour of the [455] word "pensive," which he proposes instead. ”

“ In the first place, the passages your correspondent quotes, show Angelo to be "strict," "firm," "precise," to be "a man whose blood is very snow-broth," &c., but certainly not "pensive" in the common acceptation of the word. Secondly, he fails to show that, if Shakspeare meant by "pensive" anything more than thoughtful in the passages he cites, he meant anything so strong as religiously melancholy, which would be the sense required to be of any service to him as an epithet to the word "guards." ”

“ It seems to me that a just blindness fell upon men so evil-minded as to desire the falsification of chronology and history for polemical ends, that they should have utterly missed the moral principle by which they would be thought animated. No prelate ordaining a young person, unknown to himself, save by academical reputation, could know that person's sex. ”

“ THE WINDOW-TAX, LOCAL MINTS, AND NOBBS OF NORWICH.
In a MS. chronicle, now before me, of remarkable events which occurred, in connexion with the history of the city of Norwich, from the earliest period to the year 1716, compiled by an inhabitant of the place named Nobbs, of whom a word or two at the end of this note, occurs the following passage:
"This year (1695) the parliament made an act for remedying the coin of the nation, which was generally debased by counterfeits, and diminished by clipping, and laid a tax upon glass windows, to make good the deficiency when it should be taken in. ”

“ The late Marquis Wellesley, towards the close of his long and glorious life, wrote the beautiful copy of Latin verses upon the theme "Salix Babylonica," which is printed among his Reliquiæ.
In this copy of verses is to be found the line,—
"At tu, pulchra Salix, Thamesini littoris hospes."
Certain critics object to this word "littoris," used here in the sense of "ripa." The question is, whether such an application can be borne out by ancient authorities. To be sure, the substitution of "marginis" for "littoris" would obviate all controversy ”

“ Knight in understanding "precise" as applicable to the formal cut of Angelo's garments, I nevertheless agree with him, on other grounds, in awarding a decided preference to the reading of the German critic.
A. E. B.
The Obsolete Word "Prenzie."—I agree with your correspondent LEGES, that the several emendations which have been suggested of the word "prenzie," do not "answer all the necessary conditions." [456] LEGES says, "it is universally agreed that the word is a misprint." ”

“ Moreover, such a word would never have been twice used erroneously in the same piece. May it not rather have been an adaptation from the Norman prisé, or the Latin prenso, signifying assumed, seized, &c.? The sound comes much nearer, the sense would do. I hardly like to venture a suggestion where so many eminent commentators entertain other views; but it seems to me that it is a main excellence of your periodical to encourage such suggestions; and if mine be not too wild, your insertion of it will oblige
B. B.
[5] Old as well as modern typographers need have broad backs. ”

“ Would not a list of English books printed abroad be an interesting subject for some bibliographical antiquary, and an acceptable addition to our literary antiquities?
P. B.
Bunyan and the Visions of Heaven and Hell (Vol. iii., p. 89.) .
—MR. OFFOR has very satisfactorily shown that Bunyan could not, from its grandiloquent style, have been the author of the Visions of Heaven and Hell, attributed to him in an edition of that work published in the reign of George I., entitled, The Visions of John Bunyan, being his last Remains. ”

“ Two Israelitish gentlemen, to whom they have been shown in Shanghae, say that they have seen such books in Aden; and the occurrence here and [443] there of Persian words, written with Hebrew letters, in the notes appended, seem to indicate that the books in question came originally from the western part of Asia, perhaps Persia or Arabia. There is no trace whatever of the Chinese character about them, and they must have been manufactured entirely by foreigners residing in China, or who have come from a foreign country. Regarding their age, it would be difficult to hazard even a conjecture. ”

“ A Tye (Vol. iii., p. 263.) is described by your correspondent as a place where three roads meet. Perhaps he means a place where one road divides into two. The nucleus of old English towns will be almost always found to consist of such a fork of one road into two, requiring three principal gates or entrances, and distinguishing the plans of towns from those of cities, in which four roads meet, forming the Carfoix, and requiring four principal gates. ”

“ As Aurora rises from the river Oceanus, he may be called her father, and as she sinks into the same, he may be called her grave. The expression then will mean neither more nor less than this, "We returned home before the close of day."
Perhaps Mr. Tennyson had a line of Lycidas running in his mind:
"So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed." ”

“ Beyond a few feeble and ineffective efforts on the part of Biblical critics, nothing was subsequently attempted to maintain a communication with this handful of Jews until in 1815 some brethren in London addressed a letter to them in Hebrew, and offered a large reward if any one would bring an answer in the same language. The letter was entrusted to a Chinese bookseller, a native of the province, who is reported to have delivered it, which was doubted, as he brought no written answer. ”

“ The author of Wallace was the author of The Sabbath, as well as of Poems and Tales, Scotch and English, thin 8vo., Paisley, 1794: a copy of which, as well as of Mary Stewart and Wallace, is in my tolerably extensive dramatic library. The latter is defective, ending at p. 88.; and was saved some years ago from a lot of the drama about to be consigned to the snuff-shop. Probably the same reasons which caused the suppression of a political romance from the same pen, and of which I have reason to believe the only existing copy is in my library, may have induced the non-completion of Wallace. ”

“ Hagge, doubtless the word of Shakspeare, also may be found in Rider, answering to the Latin lamia, fascinatrix, oculo maligna mulier.
Arguing from the above, what more appropriate term than "ribaudred hagge" could be applied to Cleopatra, a queen celebrated for her beauty, her cunning, her debauchery, nay, even adultery. The sister and wife of Ptolemy Dionysius, she admitted Cæsar to her embraces, and by him had a son called Cæsarion, and afterwards became enamoured of Antony, who, forgetful of his connexion with Octavia, the sister of Cæsar, publicly married her ”

“ The old Egyptian affixes which denoted the object of the verb, are in general different. En-v-tu would be "he bringeth thee;" and en-ka-su, "thou bringest him." In Coptic, the former would be e-o-en-k; the latter, e-k-en-v. Probably the Coptic prefixes were originally auxiliary verbs, or prepositions. The old Egyptian affixes greatly resemble the Hebrew ones, especially if s be substituted for the Hebrew h; and it is very remarkable that the Assyrio-Babylonian affixes differ from the Hebrew principally in this same respect. ”

“ Luncheon (Vol. iii., p. 369.) .
—I cannot help doubting this derivation; and I suspect that the true meaning of the word is, a piece, or slice (or vulgo, a "hunch") of bread. When people who dined early, and breakfasted comparatively late, wanted any intermediate refreshment, "a luncheon" (or, as we should now say, "just a crust of bread") was sufficient. The Query brought to my mind some verses of the younger Beattie, which were published with his father's Minstrel, &c., in which he uses the word "luncheon" for the piece of bread placed beside the plate at dinner. ”

“ Tingry Hill is the highest spot in the neighbourhood. In the Boulogne Museum are several mediæval antiquities found at Tingry.
P. S. KG.
Sabbatical and Jubilee Years of the Jews (Vol. iii., p. 373.) .
—You must find it difficult to know what to do when a correspondent obtains admission into your columns who absolutely requires to be sent back to elementary books. On the one hand, care must be taken not to discourage communication: on the other hand, there is a species of communication which must be gently discouraged. ”

“ The want of beard is no criterion; nor is the female lip in all instances very smooth. But if it were true that a person eminently distinguished by studies, and bringing from Athens a high reputation for merit, could upon those grounds alone obtain the suffrages of the Roman chapter, more honour would be conferred upon it than that chapter, or other dispensers of patronage, have usually merited. ”

“ Since writing the above, I see that the Bodleian Library has a copy; procured, however, it is right (for Dr. Cotton's sake) to say, since the publication of his edition of Wall's History of Infant Baptism.
J. H. T.
Trin. Coll., Dub.
LADY FLORA HASTINGS' BEQUEST.
All who reverence and love the memory of Lady Flora Hastings,—all who have had the happiness of a personal acquaintance with that gentle and gifted being,—who have mourned over her hapless fate,—who have read her poems, so full of beauty and promise, will receive her "Last Bequest" with feelings of deep interest. ”