On looking over a collection of MSS. which has lain untouched for many years, I have lighted on the accompanying ballad. Of its source I know nothing; nor do I recollect how it fell into my hands. I have never seen it in print. The author, fancifully enough, imagines the various editions of Shakspeare brought in succession to the sick-bed of the immortal bard, and has curiously detailed the result of their several prescriptions.

If do me the favour of giving it insertion in you your valuable "N. & Q." I shall feel obliged; and I think that your numerous Shakspeare correspondents, to some of whom it may be unknown, will not be displeased at seeing it in the columns of your interesting journal. The editorial period to which the ballad is brought down will tolerably fix its date:

Old Shakspeare was sick for a doctor he sent-
But 'twas long before any one came;
Yet at length his assistance Nic Row did present;
Sure all men have heard of his name.

As he found that the poet had tumbled his bed;
He smooth'd it as well as he could;
He gave him an anodyne, comb'd out his head,
But did his complaint little good.

Doctor Pope to incision at once did proceed,
And the Bard for the simples he cut ;
For his regular practice was always to bleed,
Ere the fees in his pocket he put.
Next Theobald advanced, who at best was a quack,
And dealt but in old women's stuff';

Yet he caused the physician of Twick'nam to pack,
And the patient grew cheerful enough.
Next Hanmer, who fees ne'er descended to crave,
In gloves lily-white did advance;
To the Poet the gentlest of purges he gave,
And, for exercise, taught him to dance.
One Warburton, then, tho' allied to the Church,
Produced his alterative stores;

But his medicines the case so oft left in the lurch
That Edwards* kick'd him out of doors.
Next Johnson arrived to the patient's relief,
And ten years he had him in hand;
But, tired of his task, 'tis the gen❜ral belief,
He left him before he could stand.

Now Capel drew near, not a Quaker more prim,
And number'd each hair in his pate;
By styptics, call'd stops, he contracted each limb,
And crippled for ever his gait.

* One Edwards, an apothecary, who seems to have known [more] of the poet's case than some of the regular physicians who undertook to cure him.

Of fame more desirous than pelf;
Such reading, observers might read in his looks,
As no one e'er read but himself.

Then Warner, by Plautus and Glossary known,
And Hawkins, historian of sound *;
Then Warton and Collins together came on,
For Greek and potatoes renown'd.
With songs on his pontificalibus pinn'd,
Next, Percy the Great did appear;
And Farmer, who twice in a pamphlet bad sinn'd,
Brought up the empirical rear.

"The cooks the more num'rous the worse is the broth,"

Says a proverb I well can believe; And yet to condemn them untried I am loth, So at present shall laugh in my sleeve. RIGDUM FUNNIDOS. JAMES CORNISH.

Gryphea incurva.-In the course of conversation with an old man in the county of Warwick, relative to ancient customs, he related to me as a fact within his own knowledge, that the pretty round stone shell, as he termed it (picking one up at the same time), a specimen of the Gryphea incurva, or Devil's Thumb, as it is frequently called, which is found in considerable quantities in the gravel beds of that county, when prepared in a certain manner -calcined, I believe is a certain specific for this complaint in its most obstinate form. Indeed, he related to me some very extraordinary cures which he had himself witnessed.

Donkey. A certain number of hairs taken from the black cross on the shoulders of a donkey, and put into a small bag made of black silk, and worn round a child's neck afflicted with the complaint, is a never-failing remedy.

T. B. WHITBORNE.

Minor Notes.

Epitaph in Tynemouth churchyard : "Wha lies here?

Pate Watt, gin ye speer.
Poor Pate! is that thou?
Ay, by my soul, is't;
But I's dead now."

J. MN.

Epitaph composed by an old gardener at Ilderton, Northumberland, for his own tombstone: "Under this stone lies Bobbity John,

Who, when alive, to the world was a wonder;
And would have been so yet, had not Death in a fit
Cut his soul and his body asunder."

J. MN.

Nostradamus on the Gold-diggings. Nostradamus (physician to Henry II. of France) has the following among his prophecies (p. 33.) : "Las, qu'on verra grand peuple tourmenté

Et la loy sainte en totale ruine,
Par autres Loix toute la Christianité,

Quand d'or, d'argent trouve nouvelle mine."
Garencières translates thus:

"Alas! how a great people shall be tormented,
And the holy law in an utter ruin ;
By other laws all christendom be troubled,

When new mines of gold and silver shall be found."
AGRICOLA De Monte.

under the following singular circumstances:-Many years ago, a piece of waste land, called 'Knave's Acre,' in the parish of St. Leonard's, was used as a playground by the boys of this and the adjacent parish of St. Mary Magdalen; but one day, the young gentlemen falling out, the affair ended in a regular 'fight;" and the result was that the boys of St. Leonard's van

quished their opponents, and ever after remained victors of the field. The ground was subsequently let for gardening purposes; but the owner, in perpetual remembrance of the juvenile victory, whimsically bequeathed its annual rent of 41, to be appropriated in

the manner above mentioned."

J. B. COLMAN.

The Orkneys in Pawn.-Dr. Clarke mentions a curious circumstance, which was related to him in stated that Great Britain had the Orkney Islands Norway, by Bernard Auker, of Christiana. He only in pawn. Looking over some old deeds and records, belonging to the Danish crown, at Copenhagen, Mr. Auker found that these islands were consigned to England, in lieu of a dowry for a Danish princess, married to one of our English kings, upon condition that these islands should be restored to Denmark whenever the debt for which they were pledged should be discharged. Therefore, as the price of land, and the value of money, have undergone such considerable alteration since this period, it is in the power of Denmark, for a very small sum, to claim possession of the Orkneys. KIRKWALLENSIS.

Lord Duff's Toast. Having made a considerable collection of old Scots almanacks, I find occasionally on the waste papers at the beginnings and ends some curious notes: they, however, chiefly refer to the weather, crops, fairs, and prices of corn, starting-hours of coaches, &c. I find the following toast noted on the New Scots Almanack for 1802: I send it to "N. & Q.," not knowing if it ever has been in print :

"LORD DUFF'S TOAST A.D. '45.

THE METEORIC STONE OF THE THRACIAN CHER SONESUS.

In the Quarterly Review just published, the reviewer, in the course of an interesting article on "Meteors, Aerolites, and Shooting Stars," makes a suggestion which, if admitted into "N. & Q.," may

meet the eye of some English resident or traveller in the East, who will give to it the attention it deserves.

A great degree of interest is attached to the recorded fall of aerolites in times past, and the most remarkable and authentic record of antiquity on this subject is that of the massive stone which fell in the 78th Olympiad (about the time of the birth of Socrates), at Ægospotamos (the goat's river), on the Hellespont, the place soon afterwards the scene of that naval victory of Lysander, in the last year of the Peloponnesian war, which subjected Athens and Greece for a time to the Spartan power. The fall of this stone, says the reviewer, is expressly mentioned by Aristotle; by the author of the Parian Chronicle; by Diogenes of Apollonia; and most fully by Plutarch and Pliny, both of whom distinctly state it to be shown in their time-the sixth century after its fall. Pliny's description is well marked: "Qui lapis etiam nunc ostenditur, magnitudine vehis, colore, adusto;" and be adds the fact that a burning comet (meteor) accompanied its descent. Plutarch explicitly states that it was still held in much veneration by the inhabitants of the Chersonesus. He also speaks of its vast size. If the mass remained visible, and of such magnitude as described, down to Pliny's time, it is far from impossible (remarks the reviewer) that it may even now be re-discovered, with the aid, perchance, of some stray tradition attached to the place, surviving, as often happens, the lapse of ages, the changes of human dominion, and even the change of race itself, upon the spot. The locality, indeed, is not further indicated than by the statement of its fall at Egospotamos; but the invariable manner in which it is thus described defines tolerably well the district to be examined. We learn (he adds) from the old geographers, that there was a town called Egospotami on the Thracian side of the Hellespont, and we may infer a stream from which its name was derived. The description of the naval fight, and the situation relatively to Lampsacus (the modern Lamsaki), further define the locality within certain limits. The reviewer then adds some practical suggestions of importance. The traveller devoting himself to this research should make his head-quarters_at various places near the spot in question. should render himself previously familiar with the aspect of meteoric stones, as now seen in European cabinets, and should study the character of rocks and fragmentary masses in the vicinity, to appreciate the differences of aspect. A small part only of the mass may now appear above the surface, and may even be wholly concealed by alluvial deposits, in which case the research would, of course, be in vain, unless happily aided by local tradition, which at the outset should be sedulously sought for. The research, if successful, would be of interest enough, both for history and science, to

He

perpetuate a man's name. In the hope that some of the correspondents of "N. & Q.," now sojourning in, or likely to visit the locality, may be tempted to undertake it, I send you these suggestions, extracted from an article of no small scientific interest and value; and I will conclude with the Query, whether the "sacred black stone," which is mentioned by Colonel Williams (the British Commissioner for the settlement of the Turkish boundary question) to be regarded by the Seids inhabiting Despool as their palladium, has any legend of meteoric origin connected with its history? WM. SIDNEY GIBSON.

Newcastle on Tyne.

BANBURY CAKES AND ZEAL.

The Tutler, No. 220., in describing his "Ecclesiastical Thermometer," which gave indication of the changes and revolutions in the Church, and of out the country, says: the different degrees of heat in religion through

"To complete the experiment, I prevailed upon a friend of mine, who works under me in the occult sciences, to make a progress with my glass through the whole island of Great Britain; and, after his return, to present me with a register of his observations. I guessed beforehand at the temper of several places he passed through by the characters they have had time out of mind. Thus that facetious divine, Dr. Fuller, speaking of the town of Banbury near a hundred years ago, tells us, it was a place famous for cakes and zeal, which I find by my glass is true to this day as to the latter part of this description, though I must confess it is not in the same reputation for cakes that it was in the time of that learned author."

In Gough's Camden, vol. i. p. 298., there is rather an amusing account of the manner in which the town of Banbury gained a proverbial reputation for zeal; and the following note by Mr. Camden, in his MS. supplement to the Britannia, is added:

"Put out the word zeale in Banbury, where some think it a disgrace, when as zeale with knowledge is the greater grace among good Christians; for it was first foysted in by some compositor or pressman; neither is it in my Latin copie, which I desire the reader to hold as authentic."

And Ray gives as a proverbial saying:

"Banbury veal, cheese, and cakes." and refers to the mistake in Camden.* Now it is

[* The following note respecting this misprint is given in Gibson's Camden, vol. i. p. 296., edit. 1772:"There is a credible story, that while Philemon Holland was carrying on his English edition of the Britannia, Mr. Camden came accidentally to the press, when this sheet was working off; and, looking on, he found, that to his own observation of Banbury being

possible, that Dr. Fuller derived his estimation of the town of Banbury from Camden; still, as we know that Banbury in the seventeenth century had a character for Puritanism, he may have intended by the word zeal to refer to the sectarian spirit of the inhabitants. But what I would ask is, whether any events occurred in Banbury in the eighteenth century, which justify The Tatler in classing it among those places which were hot in the cause of the Church; and giving to the words of the “facetious divine," whom he quotes, a signification entirely different to that which must have been intended?

Also, where is the first mention of Banbury cakes? Did their reputation decline in the eighteenth century, and revive again afterwards; or had they a celebrity in early days to which the present age can present no parallel? The Banbury people would hardly assent to The Tatler's disparaging remark.

Warwick.

Minor Queries.

ERICA.

Richardson or Murphy.-I have in my collection a portrait, purporting to be that of "Joseph Richardson, Esq., Barrister, and member for Newport in Cornwall," engraved in line by W. J. Newton, from a picture by the late president, M. A. Shee, Esq., R. A.; and another impression from the same plate, inscribed "James Murphy, Esq., Architect." Will any of your readers be good enough to inform me which of those gentlemen was the real Simon Pure, and what induced the alteration of name, &c.?

I could cite numerous instances of the same kind of trick having been practised, and may trouble you with further inquiries on a future occasion. At present I am anxious to ascertain whether I have got a genuine or spurious portrait in my portfolio of artists. J. BURTON.

38. Avenham Lane, Preston.

Legend attached to Creeper in the Samoan Isles. -Walpole, in his Four Years in the Pacific, mentions a creeper of most singular toughness, to which the natives attach a legend, which makes it the material employed by some fabulous ancestor to bind the sun, and which they term facehere, or Itu's cord, affirming that it cannot be broken "even by the white man, clever as he is." Mr. Walpole certainly failed in his attempts to clear a way through it. Will any of your botanical readers give me the proper name of the plant? and also of

famous for cheese, the translator had added cakes and ale. But Mr. Camden, thinking it too light an expression, changed the word ale into zeal; and so it passed, to the great indignation of the Puritans, who abounded in this town."-ED.]

American Fisheries.-Almost from the first set

tlement of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, this has been a troublesome question; and now that it is under the consideration of the English and American Governments, it is to be hoped that it may be finally settled.

In June, 1623, a vessel arrived at Plymouth, Cape Cod, commanded by Admiral West, who had been sent from England for the sole purpose of preventing all persons, whether subjects of Great Britain or foreigners, from fishing on the coast, unless they had previously obtained permission for that purpose from the Council of New England, The admiral meeting with much opposition, and finding he could not settle the question in an amicable manner, left Plymouth in disgust, and sailed for southern Virginia. The colonists then appealed to Parliament, and an act was passed that the fisheries should be free.

Query, In what year was this act passed, and has the permission then granted ever been annulled?

Malta.

W. W.

Grindle.-What is the true meaning of this word, and are any other parts of the kingdom called thus? The one I allude to is still called "The Grindle," close adjoining the town of Bury St. Edmund's; and consists of an encampment and earthworks, very similar to several mentioned before in "N. & Q." under the articles "Grimsdyke" (Vol. iv., pp. 152. 331. 454.; Vol. v., p. 43. &c.). A local guide to the town (Gillingwater, p. 5.) gives the word Grim, a fortress=Grinneal, depths in the ground.

Can any reader of your valuable Notes give further explanation of the word, or of its origin at Bury? C. G.

any

A Gentleman executed for whipping a Slave to Death.-In the first volume of Eastern Europe, published in London by T. C. Newby, in 1846, it is thus recorded:

"During the administration of Spencer Perceval, on the 8th of May, 1811, the Honourable A. W. Hodge, a member of his Britannic Majesty's council at Tortola, was executed for the murder of one of his negroes by excessive flogging."

Might I ask if there is any other instance known of a gentleman's having suffered a similar punishment for the same crime, during the period the West India islands were held as slave colonies of England? W. W.

Malta.

Brydone.-A.J. C. would be glad to be informed of the birthplace of Mr. Brydone, the tourist and author. The biographies state that he was the son of a clergyman, and born in Scotland; but do not give the exact locus in quo.

"Clear the Decks for Bognie's Carriage."-The announcement, in Punch, that the Lords of the Admiralty had ordered a large supply of arm-chairs (of course on castors) for the use of our veteran commanders, has recalled to my recollection the above, which used to pass current in Banffshire, as a call for a clear stage. Can any of your readers tell us who was "Bognie; " what was his "carriage," and what the connexion between it and "decks?" FROM THE NEighbourhood of BoGnie Brae. London Queries. - Answers to the following Queries would very much oblige me.

The date when chains and bars were first erected for levying toll into the City of London. The date of the erection of the first Temple Bar, its architect's name, and when pulled down or destroyed, and if burnt during the Great Fire. The authority for the present gate having been built after designs of Sir Christopher Wren.

J. N. G. G. Scarf worn by Clergymen - By what authority do clergymen, who are neither chaplains to any member of the royal family, or to any peer or peeress, or have not taken the degree of D.D., wear a scarf either over the surplice or the black gown? C― J. T. P.

endow so many schools, assuredly Erasmus Smith gives additional authority to the dictum, that "The world knows nothing of its greatest men."

D. C. L.

Croxton or Crostin of Lancashire.-Can any of the readers of "N. & Q." furnish me with any particulars of this family; whether they bore arms, and what they were? They are, I believe, of Lancashire origin, the name frequently occurring in the history of that county. Where is also the ancient (and formerly very extensive) parish of Crostin? W. H. COLLES.

Grub Street Journal.-Can any of your readers give me information as to the parties by whom this journal was conducted, or who formed the Grub Street Society, shortly before, and for a few years after 1730; or what this society was: or refer me to the best sources of information on the subject? My reason for asking the question is, that I have lately found a manuscript-book-a common thickish square account-book in a vellum backcontaining at one end, as it seems, the minutes of the meetings of the Grub Street Society, signed by the members at each meeting: at the other end the accounts of the funds of the association. If it should prove that the entries are genuine, and they should prove to be of any interest, I should send you some extracts from the book. REGINENSIS. Chaplain to the Princess Elizabeth. What was the surname of the person who officiated as chaplain to the Princess Elizabeth during her imprisonment at Woodstock in 1554? His Christian name was William. C. R. M.