wont to fly open at midnight "withouten hands," and a carriage drawn by four spectral horses, and accompanied by headless grooms and outriders, proceeded with great rapidity from the park to a spot called "the nursery corner." What became of the ghostly cortège at this spot, I have never been able to learn; but though the sight has not been seen by any of the present inhabitants, yet some of them have heard the noise of the headlong race. The "Corner," tradition says, is the spot where a very bloody engagement took place in olden time, when the Romans were governors of England. A few coins have I believe been found, but nothing else confirmatory of the tale. Does history in any way support the story of the battle? Whilst writing on this subject, I may as well note, that near this haunted corner is a pool called Wimbell Pond, in which tradition says an iron chest of money is concealed: if any daring person ventures to approach the pond, and throw a stone into the water, it will ring against the chest; and a small white figure has been heard to cry in accents of distress, "That's mine!" I send you these legends as I have heard them from the lips of my nurse, a native of the village. W. SPARROW SIMPSON, B.A. Theodoric, Legend of. May we not consider the Saxon legend quoted by Mr. Kemble in his Saxons in England, foot-note on page 423., vol. i., as something like a parallel to "Old Booty" and Mr. Gresham, mentioned in Vol. iii., p. 93. of "N. & Q. ?" or is it possible to have been the origin of both? The legend is, that an anchoret in Lipari told some sailors that at a particular time he had seen King Theodoric ungirt, barefoot and bound, led between St. John, pope and martyr, and St. Finian, and by them hurled into the burning crater of the neighbouring island volcano. That on the sailors' return to Italy they discovered, by comparison of dates, that Theodoric died on the day on which the anchoret noticed his punishment by the hands THOMAS LAWRENCE. of his victims. Ashby de la Zouch. P.M.M. The Banking Company in Aberdeen, and the Bank of England. The Banking Company in Aberdeen was established in the year 1767; and the following Note respecting it may be new to many of the readers of "N. & Q." This Company adopted the plan of using paper bearing in watermark a waved line, and the amount of the note expressed in words, along with the designation of the Company; but about the year 1805 a gentleman connected with Aberdeenshire brought this paper under the notice of the Bank of England, cured an act of parliament to be passed prohibitin consequence of which they adopted it, and proing the use of paper so marked by any provincial bank. PETRAPROMONTORIENSIS. Which are the Shadows?-In the notes to the beautiful poem Italy, by Samuel Rogers, published (I think) in 1830, the following occurs: Every reader of " N. & Q." must be acquainted "You admire that picture,' said an old Dominican with places throughout the country pronounced to me at Padua, as I stood contemplating a Last Supper very differently to their spelling. It has occurred in the refectory of his convent, the figures as large as to me that a collection of them would be interest-life. I have sat at my meals before it for seven-anding, both as a topographical curiosity, and as an illustration of our provincial dialects. No paper is fitter for such a collection than the "N. & Q.;" its correspondents would doubtless communicate any within their notice, and you, Mr. Editor, would from time to time give up a little space to them. The following are what I remember just now : forty years; and such are the changes that have taken place among us; so many have come and gone in the time, that when I look upon the company there-upon those who are sitting at the table silent as they - I am sometimes inclined to think that we, and not they, are the shadows."" In the sixth volume of Lord Mahon's History of England, chap. Ix. p. 498., we find this passage: "Once as Sir David Wilkie (Mr. Washington Irving and myself being then his fellow-travellers in Spain) was gazing on one of Titian's master-pieces-the famous picture of the Last Supper in the refectory of the Escurial - an old monk of the order of St. Jerome came up, and said to him, 'I have sat daily in sight of that picture for now nearly three score years. During that time my companions have dropped off, one after another—all who were my seniors, all who were of mine own age, and many or most of those who were younger than myself; nothing has been unchanged around me except those figures, large as life, in yonder painting; and I look at them till I sometimes think that they are the realities, and we the shadows.'" The great resemblance between these two passages is very striking; the latter only amplifies the former by a very few words. Cork. D. F. M'L. Antiquity of County Boundaries. In the loop of Devonshire, on the western side of the Tamar, formed by the parishes of Werrington and North Petherwyn, none of the names of places are Cornish, but end in the Saxon termination of cot, whilst in all other parts the Cornish names are used up to the banks of the river. Modern Cornwall is a province so well defined by the language of its Launceston. Zachary Pearce not a Pupil of Busby. — The birth of Zachary (afterwards Bishop) Pearce was prior to the death of the famous Master of Westminster, which took place at the short interval of five years consequently, it was impossible that the relation of teacher and pupil should exist between them. Till now I thought the proverbe did but jest, Which said a blacke sheepe was a biting beast." Here the allusion is of course to the miseries entailed by the system of sheep-farming; a system which had been introduced and carried to excess In the Memoir of this prelate, which goes before by the monastic bodies. Some years ago I met his Commentary on the Gospels, it is expressly with an old satirical song on this subject, of which stated that he was removed to Westminster School the above "proverbe " formed a kind of burden, in Feb. 1704. At the same time, his biographer but where, or in what collection I met with it, speaks of his being elected to Trinity College, I cannot for the life of me remember. Now, Cambridge, after he had spent six years at West- seeing that your periodical exemplifies very accuminster, and "endured the constraint of a gram-rately the definition once given by a Surrey peamar school to the twentieth year of his age." Then follows the sentence, "Why his removal was so long delayed, no other reason can be given, than that Dr. Busby used to detain those boys longest under his discipline of whose future eminence he had most expectation; considering the fundamental knowledge which grammar schools inculcate, as that which is least likely to be supplied by future diligence, if the student be sent deficient to the university." sant of a highly accomplished man- -"Sir! he knows everything, and what he don't know he axes," perhaps you will allow me to ask whether some one of your many able correspondents may not have the power and the will to give me this information. A worthless memory seems to suggest that the song was a Cambridge production, and interspersed with Latin phrases. Now, one word about the author of the epigram above quoted. It is not, I hope, an abuse of the freedom of speech which ought to prevail in the republic of letters, if I express a strong opinion * Noble's Continuation of Granger, vol. iii. p. 119, &c. that your learned contributor, MR. PAYNE COLLIER, has rendered very scant justice to the memory of Bastard. The epigrams selected by that gentleman as favourable samples, are among the very worst of the author's efforts. Probably not twenty copies of the Chrestoleros are in existence; but as, by the kindness of my esteemed friend E. V. Utterson, I possess one of the sixteen struck off at his own private press, I beg to supply a specimen or two, that will not only gratify your readers in general, but elicit an approving verdict from MR. COLLIER himself. For example, is not the finished cadence, as well as the nervous force, of the following lines to Sir Ph. Sidney, greatly to be admired? "When Nature wrought upon her mould so well, That Nature wondred her own work to see, When Arte so labourde Nature to excel, And both had spent their excellence in thee; Willing they gave thee into Fortune's hand, Fearing they could not end what they beganne!" In my poor judgment, those are truly noble lines. And what say you to the following, Mr. Editor, which form a sonnet rather than an epigram? "The world's great peers and mighty conquerours, Seeke not to conquer nations by the sworde, By winning them to Christ and to his worde. Give Him the new worlde for old Asia's losse, And set not up your standard, but His crosse!" I not only challenge MR. P. COLLIER's hearty approval of those magnificent lines, but I would venture the expression of a doubt whether anything finer can be produced of the same date and character. Now take a spice of Bastard's quality as a humorist; not failing to mark again the solemn flow and well-balanced cadence of the lines: "You who have sorrow's hidden bottom sounded, And felt the ground of teares and bitter your readers that Thomas Bastard has been unjustly forgotten, he shall live again in your R. C. C. pages. INUNDATIONS AND THEIR PHENOMENA. The remarkable inundations that have recently taken place (I do not, of course, allude to the accident at Holmesfirth) in various parts of the country, without any such very long-continued and violent storms of rain as one would naturally look to as their cause, have called to my recollection some remarks in the "Notices Scientifiques' of M. Arago, attached to the Annuaire pour l'An 1838, published by the Bureau des Longitudes at Paris. I beg to transcribe them : "Des historiens, les météorologistes, citent des inondations locales dont les effets ont semblé bien supérieures à ce que pouvoit faire craindre la médiocre quantité de pluie provenante des nuages et tombée dans un certain rayon. Il est rarement arrivé qu'alors on n'ait pas vu, pendant un temps plus ou moins long, d'immense masses d'eau surgir des entrailles de la terre par des ouvertures jusque là inconnues, et aussi, qu'un violent orage n'ait pas été la précurseur du phénomène, et probablement sa cause première. Telles furent, du point en point, par example, en juin, 1686, les circonstances de l'inondation qui détruisit presque en totalité les deux villages de Ketlevell et de Starbottom, dans le comté d'York. Pendant l'orage une immense crevasse se forma dans la montagne voisine, et, au dire des témoins oculaires, la masse fluide qui s'en échappa avec impétuosité contribua au moins tout autant que la pluie, aux malheurs qu'on eut à déplorer."— P. 361. 1. Is there any reason to suppose that a subterranean outburst of this nature accompanied any of the recent inundations ? 2. Does the "immense crevice" alluded to by M. Arago still exist? and does water continue to proceed from it? SYDNEY SMIRKE. A BIBLIOGRAPHICAL QUERY. In the year 1704 was published anonymously: "An Essay towards a Proposal for Catholic Communion; wherein above sixty of the principal controverted points, which have hitherto divided Christendom, being called over, 'tis examined how many of them may, and ought to be laid aside, and how few remain to be accommodated, for the effecting a general Peace. By a Minister of the Church of England. Sold by John Nutt, near Stationers' Hall, 1704." This Essay has passed through several editions in London and Dublin: to that of 1801 is prefixed a "Dedication to the Right Hon. the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and to the Hon. the House of Commons .. and the perusal of it earnestly recommended by a Lover of Christian Peace and Union and a Loyal United Briton." It has now been in circulation for nearly a century and a half; and for want of a medium of inter-communication in olden times like "N. & Q.," its authorship has frequently been a topic of keen discussion. `Mr. Oakeley, in his work, The Subject of Tract XC. historically examined, states that "Its publication attracted at the time the notice of the Government. A warrant appears to have been issued from the Secretary of State's office for the seizure of the author's papers, and the arrest of his person, under a suspicion apparently that he was in league with the Pretender." It is to be regretted that Mr. Oakeley has not given his authority for this statement. Mr. Goode, in his pamphlet entitled Tract XC. historically refuted, attributes it, on the authority of Dodd, to Thomas Dean, a Roman Catholic Fellow of University College, Oxford; whereas the author of The Sure Hope of Reconciliation, p. 61., thinks Mr. Goode's supposition open to exception; and as the writer styles himself "A Minister of the Church of England," he is inclined to admit his claim to the title, till stronger evidence be adduced to the contrary. The following curious colloquy between two priests of the Roman and Anglican Churches, in the Town Hall at Guildford, in 1838, respecting the authorship of this Essay, is also worthy a Note: "Rev. Joseph Sidden. The author of A Proposal for a Catholic Communion says "Rev. M. Hobart Seymour. Name! name "Rev. J. Sidden. I do not know his name; he appears to have been an archdeacon of the Church of England in the reign of Queen Anne. His work is on sale at Booker's. "The Chairman. Can you name the place of which he was archdeacon? "Rev. J. Sidden. No; but I give these as the words ,of a Protestant clergyman. "Rev. M. H. Seymour. You do not know that he was a Protestant at all. "Rev. J. Sidden. I have put the work into the hands of a Protestant clergyman, who agrees with it; and it agrees with Archbishop Bramhall. I have often tried to discover who was the author. "Rev. M. H. Seymour. It was written perhaps by a Roman Catholic Priest. "Rev. J. Sidden. I think not, because the Hon. and Rev. Arthur Perceval, rector of East Horsley, borrowed the book of me, and he wrote to me, that he so much approved of it, that he meant to procure a copy of it. I do not know who wrote it."- Proceedings at a Meeting of the Guildford Protestant Association, 1838, P. 20. Now, without discussing the theological points at issue between the two parties, it is desirable that the authorship of this work, as a literary production, should be finally settled, which I am inclined to think will be the case when it is brought before the numerous readers of "N. & Q." On its first appearance it was attacked by three Nonjuring clergymen, viz. Grascome, Stephens, and Spinckes. Grascome, it appears, knew the author; but his work, Concordia Discors, I have not been able to procure. (See Life of Kettlewell, p. 328.) It is not to be found in the catalogues of the Bodleian, British Museum, or Sion College. The replies by Edward Stephens and Nathanael Spinckes are both in the Bodleian. The first edition of the original Essay, 1704, is in the British Museum, and on the title-page is written in pencil, "By Thomas Dean, a papist," and underneath, in ink, By Nathanael Spinckes, not a Roman Catholic." The latter entry is clearly a mistake. 66 After some investigation, it appears to me that the authorship rests between Thomas Dean and Joshua Bassett. It is attributed to the former by Dodd (alias Tootle) in his Certamen utriusque Ecclesiæ; but Wood, who has given some account of Dean in his Athene Oxon., vol. iv. p. 450. (Bliss), does not include this Essay among his other works. In the Bodleian Catalogue its authorship is attributed to Joshua Bassett, Master of Sidney College, Cambridge, of whom our biographical dictionaries are perfectly silent. Fortunately, Cole has preserved some notices of him in his MSS., vol. xx. p. 117. It appears that he was a Roman Catholic, and had mass publicly said in his college; but upon King James revoking the mandamuses in 1688, he left Cambridge and settled in London, where, says Cole, "he lived to be a very old man, and died in no very affluent circumstances, as we may well imagine." Cole notices a work by Bassett published anonymously, viz. Reason and Authority; or the Motives of a late Protestant's Reconciliation to the Catholic Church. London: 1687, 4to. With this clue, probably, some of your readers can finally settle the question. Hoxton. J. Y. NEW ARRANGEMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. I am engaged in preparing the Old Testament on the same plan, but with some alterations and additions, as the Chronological New Testament described in Vol. iv., p. 357. I write to ask if any of your correspondents can aid me in my undertaking in the following points: I. To inform me where I can procure, by purchase, or by loan for a few weeks, Torshell's tract or book, in which he proposed to Charles I. to undertake such a work. II. To make a re-division, according to the subject-matter, of Job, Ecclesiastes, and the greater and the minor prophets. III. To draw up a brief analysis of this subjectmatter, similar to what is attempted in the New Testament for the Epistles. IV. To extract from the Mishneh, &c., the Is there I believe not-any truth in this really valuable comments of the rabbis. tradition; and where may the earliest allusion to it V. To make up the chronology into the follow-be found. ing four great unequal divisions, assigning the particular years to each transaction falling under these divisions; viz., (a) Adam to Abraham, (b) Abraham to David; (c) David to the transportation of Judah to Babylon; (d) Transportation to Babylon to Christ. VI. To collate all these important variations of the Septuagint and of the Samaritan Pentateuch. VII. Critically to examine the introductions, marginal quotations, and the analyses, as given in the Chronological New Testament. I shall with pleasure present any gentleman who will help me in any one of these particulars with a copy of the New Testament at once, if he will signify his wish for one, in a line addressed to me, care of the Publisher, Mr. Blackader, 13. Paternoster Row. THE EDITOR OF THE "CHRONOLOGICAL NEW Trinity Square, Southwark. Minor Queries. Pasquinades. Can any correspondent tell me under whose reign the following pasquinade was published? The reigning Pope had erected a new order of knighthood, and the crosses were very lavishly distributed; upon which Pasquin said "In tempi men' leggiadri e più feroci L. H. J. T. Sir John Fenner's Bequest of Bibles.-Sir John Fenner, by will dated 1633, desired his executors to employ monies in purchasing lands (which has since produced 6207. per annum, but now less than that amount), the rent to be laid out every Easter in buying Bibles and distributing money for and amongst the poor of ten parishes in the metropolis. I shall feel thankful for any information relating to that benevolent gentleman communicated either through your columns, or to me at 35. Gifford Street, Kingsland Road, London. HENRY EDWARDS, (a Subscriber from the beginning). Friday at Sea.-I have heard a story respecting the superstition in which sailors hold Friday as a day of departure. To disabuse them of this superstition, a ship- so runs the tale - was laid down on a Friday; launched on a Friday; commanded by a captain named Friday; sailed on a Friday; and -so runs the story-was never heard of afterwards! ? Meaning of "Knarres.". In a minister's account of the time of Edward II., relating to Caernarvonshire, is an entry for rent received "de terra morosa et knarres:" the word is sometimes written gnarres. What does it mean? I believe in Norfolk and in other counties a description of scrubby woodland is known by the name of carrs (Query spelling). We find Knares-borough in Yorkshire, and Knares-dale in Northumberland, Nar-borough in Leicester, Nar-burgh and Narford in Norfolk. Taking the n to be the expressive letter, we have perhaps specimens of its softened sound in the names of Snare-hill, Snar-gate, Snares-brook, &c., in various counties. Some of your etymological readers may be able to explain the derivation of these names, should they be considered to come from a common source, and with that the sentence quoted above. J. Br. Sir John Cheke. - May I hope for a reply to my Queries in what court poor Sir John Cheke was forced to sit beside Bishop Bonner, at the trials of the martyrs? and at whose trials he was present? His sad recantation took place in the year 1556, and his death, from a broken heart, in the year following; so that his being compelled to sit on the bench beside Bonner, must have been at the trials which took place between those two dates. I have Foxe, Fuller, and Strype's memoirs of Sir John Cheke; but I shall be grateful for any information about him from any other old volumes, or from private sources. C. B. T. Arms of Yarmouth.-What authority has Gwillim, in his Display of Heraldrie, p. 258., for asserting |