Curiosities of Literature Volume Ii Part 52

Mr. Mead writes to Sir M. Stuteville, July 25, 1629.

"His majesty was wont to answer the French amba.s.sador in his own language; now he speaks in English, and by an _interpreter_. And so doth Sir Thomas Edmondes to the French king; contrary to the ancient custom: so that altho' of late we have not equalled them in arms, yet now we shall equal them in ceremonies."

Oct. 31, 1628.

"This day fortnight, the States' amba.s.sador going to visit my lord treasurer about some business, whereas his lords.h.i.+p was wont always to bring them but to the stairs' head, he then, after a great deal of courteous resistance on the amba.s.sador's part, attended him through the hall and court-yard, even to the very boot of his coach."--_Sloane MSS_.

4178.]

[Footnote 101: Clarendon's Life, vol. ii. p. 160.]

[Footnote 102: The Diary of William Raikes, Esq., has only recently been published: it relates to the first half of the present century, and proves that the race of diarists are not extinct among ourselves.]

[Footnote 103: Ashmole noted every trifle, even to the paring of his nails; and being as believer in astrology, and a student in the occult sciences, occasionally mentions his own superst.i.tious observances. Thus, April 11, 1681, he notes--"I took, early in the morning, a good dose of elixir, and hung three spiders about my neck, and they drove my ague away. Deo Gratias!"]

[Footnote 104: This diary has been published since the above was written.]

[Footnote 105: It is a thin book, simply lapped in parchment, and filled with brief memorandums written in a remarkably neat and minute hand.]

[Footnote 106: This has also been published in a handsome quarto volume since the above was written. Roberta's collection of Anglo-Gallic coins are now in the British Museum.]

[Footnote 107: Sir Thomas Crew's Collection of the Proceedings of the Parliament, 1628, p. 71.]

[Footnote 108: The consequence of this prohibition was, that our own men of learning were at a loss to know what arms the enemies of England, and of her religion, were fabricating against us. This knowledge was absolutely necessary, as appears by a curious fact in Strype's Life of Whitgift. A license for the importation of foreign books was granted to an Italian merchant, with orders to collect abroad this sort of libels; but he was to deposit them with the archbishop and the privy council. A few, no doubt, were obtained by the curious, Catholic or Protestant.--Strype's "Life of Whitgift," p. 268.]

[Footnote 109: The author, with his publisher, who had their right hands cut off, was John Stubbs of Lincoln's Inn, a hot-headed Puritan, whose sister was married to Thomas Cartwright, the head of that faction. This execution took place upon a scaffold, in the market-place at Westminster. After Stubbs had his right hand cut off, with his left he pulled off his hat, and cried with a loud voice, "G.o.d save the Queen!"

the mult.i.tude standing deeply silent, either out of horror at this new and unwonted kind of punishment, or else out of commiseration of the undaunted man, whose character was unblemished. Camden, a witness to this transaction, has related it. The author, and the printer, and the publisher were condemned to this barbarous punishment, on an act of Philip and Mary, _against the authors and publishers of seditious writings_. Some lawyers were honest enough to a.s.sert that the sentence was erroneous, for that act was only a temporary one, and died with Queen Mary; but, of these honest lawyers, one was sent to the Tower, and another was so sharply reprimanded, that he resigned his place as a judge in the Common Pleas. Other lawyers, as the lord chief justice, who fawned on the prerogative far more then than afterwards in the Stuart reigns, a.s.serted that Queen Mary was a king; and that an act made by any king, unless repealed, must always exist, because the King of England never dies!]

[Footnote 110: A letter from J. Mead to Sir M. Stuteville, July 19, 1628. Sloane MSS. 4178.]

[Footnote 111: See "Calamities of Authors," vol. ii. p. 116.]

[Footnote 112: It is a quarto tract, ent.i.tled "Mr. John Milton's Character of the Long Parliament and a.s.sembly of Divines in 1641; omitted in his other works, and never before printed, and very seasonable for these times. 1681." It is inserted in the uncastrated edition of Milton's prose works in 1738. It is a retort on the _Presbyterian_ Clement Walker's History of the _Independents_; and Warburton, in his admirable characters of the historians of this period, alluding to Clement Walker, says--"Milton was even with him in the fine and severe character he draws of the Presbyterian administration."]

[Footnote 113: Southey, in his "Doctor," has a whimsical chapter on Anagrams, which, he says, "are not likely ever again to hold so high a place among the prevalent pursuits of literature as they did in the seventeenth century, when Louis XIII. appointed the Provencal, Thomas Billen, to be his royal anagrammatist, and granted him a salary of 12,000 livres."]

[Footnote 114: Two of the luckiest hits which anagrammatists have made, were on the Attorney-General _William Noy_--"I moyl in law;" and _Sir Edmundbury G.o.dfrey_--"I find murdered by rogues." But of unfitting anagrams, none were ever more curiously unfit than those which were discovered in Marguerite de Valois, the profligate Queen of Navarre--"Salve, Virgo Mater Dei; ou, de vertu royal image."--Southey's _Doctor_.]

[Footnote 115: Drummond of Hawthornden speaks of anagrams as "most idle study; you may of one and the same name make both good and evil. So did my uncle find in _Anna Regina_, 'Ingannare,' as well of _Anna Britannorum Regina_, 'Anna regnantium arbor;' as he who in _Charles de Valois_ found 'Cha.s.se la dure loy," and after the ma.s.sacre found 'Cha.s.seur desloyal.' Often they are most false, as _Henri de Bourbon_ 'Bonheur de Biron.' Of all the anagrammatists, and with least pain, he was the best who out of his own name, being _Jaques de la Chamber_, found 'La Chamber de Jaques,' and rested there: and next to him, here at home, a gentleman whose mistress's name being _Anna Grame_, he found it an 'Anagrame' already."]

[Footnote 116: See _ante_, LITERARY FOLLIES, what is said on _Pannard_.]

[Footnote 117: An allusion probably to Archibald Armstrong, the fool or privileged jester of Charles I., usually called _Archy_, who had a quarrel with Archbishop Laud, and of whom many _arch_ things are on record. There is a little jest-book, very high priced, and of little worth, which bears the t.i.tle of _Archie's Jests_.]

[Footnote 118: The writer was Bancroft, who, in his _Two Books of Epigrams_, 1639, has the following addressed to the poet--

Thou hast so us'd thy pen, or _shooke thy speare_, That poets startle, nor thy wit come neare.

[Footnote 119: There can be little doubt now, after a due consideration of evidence, that the proper way of spelling our great dramatist's name is Shakespeare, in accordance with its signification; but there is good proof that the p.r.o.nunciation of the first syllable was short and sharp, and the Warwicks.h.i.+re _patois_ gave it the sound of _Shaxpere_. In the earliest entries of the name in legal records, it is written Schakespere; the name of the great dramatist's father is entered in the Stratford corporation books in 1665 as _John_ _Shacksper_. There are many varieties of spelling the name, but that is strictly in accordance with other instances of the looseness of spelling usual with writers of that era; as a general rule, _the printed form_ of an author's name seldom varied, and may be accepted as the correct one.]

[Footnote 120: The term seems to have been applied to the article from the pointed or _peaked_ edges of the lace which surrounded the stiff pleated ruffs, and may be constantly seen in portraits of the era of Elizabeth and James.]

[Footnote 121: Nat. Hist. lib. ix. 56. Snails are still a common dish in Vienna, and are eaten with eggs.]

[Footnote 122: Dr. Lister published in the early part of the last century an amusing poem, "The Art of Cookery, in imitation of 'Horace's Art of Poetry.'"]

[Footnote 123: Genial. Dierum, II. 283, Lug. 1673. The writer has collected in this chapter a variety of curious particulars on this subject.]

[Footnote 124: The commentators have not been able always to a.s.sign known names to the great variety of fish, particularly sea-fish, the ancients used, many of which we should revolt at. One of their dainties was a sh.e.l.l-fish, p.r.i.c.kly like a hedgehog, called _Echinus_. They ate the dog-fish, the star-fish, porpoises or sea-hogs, and even seals. In Dr. Moffet's "Regiment of Diet," an exceeding curious writer of the reign of Elizabeth, republished by Oldys, may be found an ample account of the "sea-fish" used by the ancients.--Whatever the _Glociscus_ was, it seems to have been of great size, and a sh.e.l.l-fish, as we may infer from the following curious pa.s.sage in Athenaeus. A father, informed that his son is leading a dissolute life, enraged, remonstrates with his pedagogue:--"Knave! thou art the fault! hast thou ever known a philosopher yield himself so entirely to the pleasures thou tellest me of?" The pedagogue replies by a Yes! and that the sages of the Portico are great drunkards, and none know better than they _how to attack a Glociscus_.]

[Footnote 125: Ben Jonson, in his "Staple of News," seems to have had these pa.s.sages in view when he wrote:--

A master cook! Why, he's the man of men For a professor, he designes, he drawes.

He paints, he carves, he builds, he fortifies; Makes citadels of curious fowl and fish.

Some he dry-dishes, some moats round with broths, Mounts marrow-bones, cuts fifty-angled custards, Bears bulwark pies, and for his outerworks He raiseth ramparts of immortal crust; And teacheth all the tactics at one dinner: What rankes, what files to put his dishes in; The whole art military. Then he knows The influence of the stars upon his meats, And all their seasons, tempers, qualities; And so to fit his relishes and sauces, He has Nature in a pot, 'bove all the chemists, Or airy brethren of the rosy-cross.

He is an architect, an ingineer, A soldier, a physician, a philosopher, A general mathematician!

[Footnote 126: Sat. iv. 140.]

[Footnote 127: Miscellaneous Works, vol. v. 504.]

[Footnote 128: Seneca, Ep. 18.]

[Footnote 129: Horace, in his dialogue with his slave Davus, exhibits a lively picture of this circ.u.mstance. Lib. ii. Sat. 7.]

[Footnote 130: A large volume might be composed on these grotesque, profane, and licentious feasts. Du Cange notices several under different terms in his Glossary--Festum Asinorum, Kaleudae, Cervula. A curious collection has been made by the Abbe Artigny, in the fourth and seventh volumes of his "Memoires d'Histoire," &c. Du Radier, in his "Recreations Historiques," vol. i. p. 109, has noticed several writers on the subject, and preserves one on the hunting of a man, called Adam, from Ash-Wednesday to Holy-Thursday, and treating him with a good supper at night, peculiar to a town in Saxony. See "Ancillon's Melange Critique,"

&c., i. 39, where the pa.s.sage from Raphael de Volterra is found at length. In my learned friend Mr. Turner's second volume of his "History of England," p. 367, will be found a copious and a curious note on this subject.]

[Footnote 131: Thiers. Traite des Jeux, p. 449. The _fete Dieu_ in this city of Aix, established by the famous _Rene d'Anjou_, the Troubadour king, was re markable for the absurd mixture of the sacred and profane.

There is a curious little volume devoted to an explanation of those grotesque ceremonies, with engravings. It was printed at Aix in 1777.]

[Footnote 132: The custom is now abolished.]

[Footnote 133: Selden's "Table Talk."]

[Footnote 134: It may save the trouble of a reference to give here a condensation of Stubbes' narrative. He says that the Lord of Misrule, on being selected takes twenty to sixty others "lyke hymself" to act as his guard, who are decorated with ribbons, scarfs, and bells on their legs.

"Thus, all things set in order, they have their hobby-horses, their dragons, and other antiques, together with their gaudie pipers, and thunderyng drummers, to strike up the devill's dance withal." So they march to the church, invading it, even though service be performing, "with such a confused noyse that no man can heare his own voice." Then they adjourn to the churchyard, where booths are set up, and the rest of the day spent in dancing and drinking. The followers of "My Lord" go about to collect money for this, giving in return "badges and cognizances" to wear in the hat; and do not scruple to insult, or even "duck," such as will not contribute. But, adds Stubbes, "another sort of fantasticall fooles" are well pleased to bring all sorts of food and drink to furnish out the feast.]

[Footnote 135: A rare quarto tract seems to give an authentic narrative of one of these grand Christmas keepings, exhibiting all their whimsicality and burlesque humour: it is ent.i.tled "Gesta Grayorum; or the History of the high and mighty Prince Henry, Prince of Purpoole, Arch-duke of Stapulia and Bernardia (Staple's and Bernard's Inns), Duke of High and Nether-Holborn, Marquess of St. Giles and Tottenham, Count Palatine of Bloomsbury and Clerkenwell, Great Lord of the Cantons of Islington, Kentish Town, &c., Knight and Sovereign of the most heroical Order of the Helmet, who reigned and died A.D. 1594." It is full of burlesque speeches and addresses. As it was printed in 1688, I suppose it was from some ma.n.u.script of the times; the preface gives no information. Hone, in his "Year-Book," has reprinted this tract, which abounds with curious details of the mock-dignity a.s.sumed by this _pseudo_-potentate, who was ultimately invited, with all his followers, to the court of Queen Elizabeth, and treated by her as n.o.bly as if he had been a real sovereign.]

[Footnote 136: On the last Revels held, see _Gent. Mag._ 1774, p. 273.]

[Footnote 137: Pleasant Notes upon Don Quixote, by Edmund Gayton, Esq., folio, 1654, p. 24.]

[Footnote 138: The universities indulged in similar festivities. An account of the Christmas Prince, elected by the University of Oxford in 1607, was published in 1816, from a ma.n.u.script preserved in St. John's College, where his court was held. His rule commenced by the issuing of, "an act for taxes and subsidies" toward the defrayment of expenses, and the appointment of a staff of officers. After this the revels opened with a banquet and a play. The whole of his brief reign was conducted in "right royal" style. His mandates were constructed in the manner of a king; he was ent.i.tled "Prince of Alba Fortunata, Lord of St. John's, Duke of St. Giles', Marquess of Magdalen's," &c. &c.; and his affairs were similarly dignified with burlesque honours. "His privy chamber was provided and furnished with a chair of state placed upon a carpet, with a cloth of state hang'd over it, newly made for the same purpose." At banquetings and all public occasions he was attended by his whole court.

The whole of the sports occupied from the 21st of December until Shrove Tuesday, when the entertainments closed with a play, being one of eight performed at stated times during the festivities, which were paid for by the contributions of the collegians and heads of the house.]