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foundation of the Gloucestershire Society, namely, in the year 1657. The account is taken, in an abridged form, from the Report of that Society for 1855.-We fear that the other song, "True Blue," will only be found in the Gloucestershire papers.]

AUTHOR WANTED.-There has lately come under my notice a small 8vo volume, bound in vellum, and extending to 296 pages; others being lost, as well as the title-page and latter part of the dedication. The title appears to be Naturall and Artificiall Directions for Health. The "Epistle Dedicatorie" is addressed to Sir Francis Bacon, Knight, &c. It is a very curious, quaint, and clever book, evidently the work of a man of intelligence and learning; and I am desirous of knowing who he was. This is the "fift Impression," and the author intimates that he is "engaged for a Plantation in the Southerne parts of Newfoundland;" that he had travelled in Spain, Hungary, and Italy. Alludes to his "worthy cousen Sir Thomas Button," the navigator; and to "a little Treatise of mine, De Sphærarum ordine, among other poems, imprinted at London, 1598." Also, to a work of his " called The Spirit of Detraction coniured and convicted, and the Golden Groue." His initials may be "B. R." If the author be not sufficiently well known, these allusions may help to identify him. Chap. x., on "Tobacco-taking, is especially quaint and amusing, and contains some very good advice withal to smokers.

W. W. S.

[The author of the works noticed by our correspondent is William Vaughan, son of Walter Vaughan, Esq., of Golden Grove, in Caermarthenshire, and younger brother of Sir John Vaughan, the first Earl of Carbery. William was born in 1577, and studied at Oxford. The most important event of his life was founding a colony in the southernmost part of Newfoundland, to which he gave the name of Cambriol, afterwards called Britanniola, where he was living in 1628, but the time of his death is unknown. The first work noticed above is entitled, Directions for Health, both Naturall and Artificiall: Approved and derived from the best Physitians, as well moderne as auncient, London, 12mo, 1602, 1607, 1617. For some account of the author and his other works, consult Wood's Athena Oron., by Bliss, ii. 905; Chalmers's Biog. Dict.; and Williams's Biog. Dict. of Eminent Welshmen, 8vo, 1852, p. 514.]

CLERKENWELL.-I shall be greatly obliged if any reader of "N. & Q." will favour me with information relative to the history of Clerkenwell. I am now editing the late Mr. Pinks's Chronicles of that parish, and shall be glad to have assistance in my work, however small the assistance may be. EDWARD J. WOOD.

Myddelton House, Clerkenwell.

[The request made by our correspondent is not suffi ciently definite, as probably he would receive many papers which were known to Mr. Pinks, who devoted several years in making researches connected with this parish. Such works as Stow, Maitland, and Malcolm, in addition to Cromwell's History of Clerkenwell, have doubtless been well digested; but particulars of the parish in out-of-the

way books, or in the manuscript treasures of the British Museum and State Paper Office will, we conceive, be very acceptable.

There is one curious matter somewhat connected with this locality, namely, the History of the Stroud Green Corporation, which seems to require further elucidation. From the little that is known of it, it appears that when the Comic Muse took refuge in theatrical buildings, the ancient Society of Parish Clerks became divided-some turned their genius to wrestling and mimicry at Bartholomew Fair, whilst others, for their better administration, formed themselves into the Society of the Mayor, Aldermen, and Recorder of Stroud Green, assembling at the Old Crown in Merry Islington; but still saving their right to exhibit at the Old London Spaw, formerly Clerks' Well, when they might happen to have learned sheriffs and other officers to get up their sacred pieces as usual. Even so late as the year 1774 (according to Lewis's Islington, p. 281), the members of this ancient Society were accustomed to meet annually in the summer time at Stroud Green, near Hornsey Wood House, and to regale themselves in the open air; the number of persons drawn to the spot on these occasions produced a scene similar should consult the records of the Society of Parish Clerks. to that of a country wake or fair. Our correspondent The hall of the Company is in Silver Street, Wood Street.]

QUOTATION WANTED.-In a speech of the Earl of Derby, which I read at the time it was delivered, his Lorship quoted the following line:

"My wound is great, because it is so small." It seemed quite familiar to me, as I doubt not it is to you; but hitherto I have failed to remember its author. Pray help me; that is, if it be not a breach of privilege to notice language used in the House of Lords. R. C. H.

[This quotation is attributed to Dryden in connection with the following incident:-" In one of Dryden's plays there was this line, which the actress endeavoured to speak in as moving and affecting a tone as she could:

'My wound is great, because it is so small!' And then she paused, and looked very distressed. The Duke of Buckingham [George Villiers], who was in one of the boxes, rose immediately from his seat, and added in a loud ridiculing voice

'Then 'twould be greater, were it none at all!' which had such an effect on the audience, who before were not very well pleased with the play, that they hissed the poor woman off the stage, would never bear her appearance in the rest of her parts; and as this was only the second time of its performance, made Dryden lose his

benefit night."

A condensed notice of this pretty story is given in Walpole's Royal and Noble Authors, by Park, iii. 306, where it is added that "the play was instantly damned." It is more circumstantially narrated by Genest (Hist. of the Stage, i. 117), who quotes Malone as his authority. Malone (in Dryden's Prose Works, iv. 190) refers us to Spence. Spence (Anecdotes, edit. 1820, p. 103, and edit. 1858, p. 47) found it among the gossiping jottings of Dr. Lockier, Dean of Peterborough. But not one of these writers has favoured us with the title of the play or the name of the actress. Dryden's next editor may probably be able to clear up this matter.]

GRAND JURY.-Can you inform me from what data, whether from the returns of the assessed

taxes, or others, lists of persons liable to serve on SIGMA. the Grand Jury are compiled?

[In the first week of July in every year, the clerk of the peace for the county, through the high constable, issues a precept to the churchwardens and overseers of each parish for an alphabetical list of every man qualified and liable to serve on juries; copies of this list are to be fixed on the church doors on the first three Sundays in September. The lists are afterwards delivered by the

of mythology will most probably be succeeded by the introduction of some other mode of superstition." It occurs towards the close of chap. xv. In the one volume edition of 1830, at p. 199.]

Replies.

JERUSALEM.*

(3rd S. iv. 92.)

high constable to the next court of quarter sessions, from THE KNIGHTS HOSPITALLERS OF ST. JOHN OF which the sheriff selects the names of all persons described as an esquire, or person of higher degree, as a banker or merchant. The various qualifications are defined by the statute 6 & 7 Geo. IV. c. 50, s. 27. The jurymen of the London sessions are summoned by a precept in the names I was in hopes that this discussion would have of the justices tested by the Lord Mayor; one panel only drawn from MAJOR PORTER, or some advocate of is for the grand and petty juries, from which twenty-three the pretensions of the Langue, a detailed explannames are first taken by ballot for the grand jury, and ation of that mysterious proceeding-their foundtwelve others for the petty jury. Blackstone's Commen-ation; with the names of those, both French and taries by Kerr, iii. 388, ed. 1857; and 2nd Report of Spanish, who assisted at and confirmed the transMunicipal Corporations, p. 135.] action. The Synoptical Sketch (p. 24) mentions the Count de Feuillasse and Chevalier de Chas-. telain; neither of whom, certainly, are on the roll of the French Knights of Justice. Mention is also made of an anonymous "Chancellor of the Gallic Languages." Besides these, we have heard the name of the "Mandataire Général" (whatever that may be), whose name has also been heard of in connection with certain law proceedings in Paris against traffickers in spurious orders, titles, and diplomas of various kinds. We have also the name of the "Agent General" employed by the soi-disant Capitular Commission, in the work of the revival of the Langue: to wit, a respectable tailor in Waterloo Place (3rd S. iii. 334).

MIKOTZI. Can you, or any of your correspondents, find out for me the history of Mikotzi, a Jewish Rabbi, mentioned by Bp. Patrick in his Commentary? I have looked into the usual sources of information, the biographical dictionaries, into Bartolocci, Wolf, and Steinschneider, but in vain. I have looked also into Watt, Brunet, the Bodleian Catalogue, &c., but in vain.

Shoreditch.

T. SIMPSON EVANS.

[A full account of Rabbi Moses ben Rabbi Jacobi Mikotzi may be seen in Bartolocci, iv. 75, et seq. There is also a brief notice of him in Jöcher, Gelehrten-Lexicon, iii. 709. Mikotzi is de Cotzi, i. e. of Cozzo in Piedmont.]

THE PRAYER FOR THE HIGH COURT OF PAR

LIAMENT.-In Common Prayer Books of the last
century, I have observed that the words, "our
sovereign and his kingdoms," are used; but in
the more modern books, we pray for "our sove-
reign and her dominions." I beg to inquire at
what date this alteration took place, and by what
authority it was effected?
W. W. S.

[The word Dominions was substituted for Kingdoms by an Order of Council of January 1, 1801, at the legislative Union of Great Britain and Ireland.]

To "BUZZ" THE BOTTLE.-A call to finish the contents of a bottle, before refilling it with wine, is conveyed by the term to "buzz," and in some places to "buzzore" or "buzzoi" it. Whence comes the expression?

T.

[It was conjectured by a correspondent in our 1st S. v. 187, that Buzz is a corruption of bouse, or booze, to drink to excess. In Scotland they say "bouze a'," drink all.] GIBBON.-There is a passage in Gibbon's Decline and Fall, commencing, "So urgent on the vulgar is the necessity of believing," &c. Will any reader of "N. & Q." kindly refer me to the chapter where this passage is to be found?

D.

[The entire passage reads: "So urgent on the vulgar is the necessity of believing, that the fall of any system

I may here observe, en passant, that there is no. mention of the Langue in the Chancellerie of the Order, beyond some half-a-dozen loose sheets of correspondence in 1838, and again in 1841 or 1844; an abortive effort on the part of that society to obtain some notice or recognition from the S. Council.

With regard to the Languages of Spain, which, we are told, assisted in the operation of reviving the Langue in 1826, I will observe that there are only thirteen Knights of Justice of the old Royal Spanish Order in existence, all of whose names are well known to me.

It was my fortune, some few years ago, and since my commissionership expired, to be the medium of communication between these old cavaliers and the S. Council. I took the opportunity to inquire of one of them, the Marquis d'A. (chief of the illustrious family of C., which has given two Grand Masters, and a succession of gallant knights to the Religion for centuries) whether any of the Spanish Royal Order had assisted officially in the restoration of a Langue in England in 1826, or at any other time.

* Concluded from “ N. & Q" 3rd S. iv. 191.

The Marquis d'A.* assured me, in the first place, that neither he nor any of his confrères had, to his knowledge, even heard of a Langue of England; and that, in the next place, it was simply impossible that any of their body could have assisted, legally, at such a proceeding; for to have done so, they must first have. secured the permission of the Council of the Royal Spanish Order, which could not have been conceded without an appeal to the king, and that the king would not have granted the necessary powers without some preliminary diplomatic understanding with the ministers of England and France. So that we may conclude that the assertion is as trustworthy and truthful as that of the revival by the Grand Prior, Sir Robert Peat, of a lapsed corporation, by an oath before the Lord Chief Justice Denman.

I have heard, by-the-way, that there is an entry in the parochial register of New Brentford to the effect, that Sir Robert Peat took the sacrament on a certain day in the parish church, in pursuance of the Corporation Laws of England, on his entering upon office as "Lord Grand Prior of the Sixth, or English Language, of the Sovereign Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem;" which act was attested by the Rev. the curate, the two churchwardens, and the parish clerk! (Shades of L'Isle Adam and La Valette!) Perhaps some of your readers can, and will, verify this queer story.

I shall not remark upon the rest of MAJOR PORTER'S communication, which is merely a repetition of the statements of the Syn. Sketch; nor (beyond a reply to the query that preludes that attempt) shall I offer any comment upon an attempt, feeble as unworthy, to enlist a "No Popery" prejudice on the side he advocates.

MAJOR PORTER asks why the protest against the pretensions of the Langue, a copy of which was sent to you by SIR GEORGE BOWYER (3rd S. iii. 252), had not been issued during the thirty previous years of that Langue's existence?

The real solution of this problem differs somewhat from that which he propounds.

In the year 1858 or 1859 the Langue published a re-issue of their famous Synoptical Sketch, and introduced prominently therein a list of their

councillors and other officebearers. At the head of this list they placed the name of the venerable Bali, fra. Philip de Colloredo, as Lieutenant of the Mastership of the Sovereign Order of St. John of Jerusalem; and also the name of every member of the S. Council of the order that had

To prove how little the Royal Spanish Order of St. John consider themselves a branch of the Knights Hospitallers, or their Cross anything but a Spanish decoration, this venerable Knight petitioned the Lieutenant of the Mastership to be received into the real Order, and I was present at his reception in 1859.

at any time been incidentally mentioned in my official correspondence with the authorities of the Langue as their commissioner, thereby leaving it to be implied, with the characteristic veracity of that pamphlet, that the Langue was a legitimate branch of the Order of St. John, and, as such, recognised by the Lieutenant of the Mastership. and S. Council of the Order.

This cool and impudent assertion by implication of what was the very reverse of truth, coupled with their thirty years' previous pretensions, if left uncontradicted, might, even in a legal point of view, have amounted to a virtual acknowledgement on the part of the Order of the justice of the Langue's pretensions and assertions. Hence the protest; and MAJOR PORTER may rest as sured that, but for this proceeding on the part of the Langue, no such protest would have been issued against them any more than against another respectable society, who, like the Langue, and with about equal right, style themselves "Knights of St. John"; who, like the Langue too, meet occasionally for convivial purposes at the old gate of Clerkenwell; and who, like the Langue again, have issued their official papers and circulars from the same ancient and interesting public-house.

All the observations of ANTIQUARIUS, who follows in the wake of MAJOR PORTER, may be reduced to one single proposition, viz. that at present the Order of St. John of Jerusalem is neither so rich, powerful, nor influential as it was one hundred years ago.

The fact of the decadency and comparative insignificance of this celebrated confraternity, for so many ages the pride as well as bulwark of Christendom, he conceives to be a rare good joke, and chuckles over the idea of its present weakness in the spirit, if not in the very words of Melchisedec Gullcrammer, regardless of the just rejoinder:

-

"Aye? 'tis the jest at which fools laugh the loudest,

The downfall of the old nobility."

Well, granted that it is shorn of its power and consequence, nevertheless it is the true and genuine relic of what was once so grand and glorious; and

In the Clerkenwell News of the last week of June,

1858, is a long account of a banquet held in honour of the great day of the patron of the Order, St. John, in the tavern of the Old Gate of Clerkenwell, at which a very numerous assembly of the Langue assisted; indeed, if I may judge of the importance attached to this banquet by the following extract of a letter addressed to me by the "Grand Secretary," it was a demonstration, or regular levée de boucliers: "We have made a move of no little significance, as regards determination, when our Executive Council took up on the 24th ult. a position in the ruins of the Priory of Clerkenwell, and unfurled in the face of Protestant and Catholic, our time-glorious ensigns as a sovereign fraternity. By this step we have given hostages to futurity, that nulla retrorsum' is to be the motto of our movement. We have passed the Rubicon," &c. &c.

She

LAWS OF LAURISTON. (3rd S. iii. 486; iv. 31, 76, 132.) Some of the statements made by A. T. LEE, touching the Laws of Lauriston, are incorrect In the first place, Margaret Hay did not marry James McClennan, as A. T. LEE asserts. married Dr. William Carruthers of Dumfries, and by that marriage had six children, viz. James, Law, Robert, Henrietta, Margaret, and Wingate. Wingate Carruthers married George McClennan, and it was Wingate's daughter Margaret who married Captain Lee, R.N. That F. J. W. Law

its governing chief is acknowledged to be the legitimate representative of the D'Aubussons, L'Isle Adams, and La Valettes of other times by every sovereign court in Europe. Even the laws of England admitted that fact, as a perusal of the case of "Candida v. Moncorvo " will demonstrate. And here let me ask a question regarding that case that touches nearly the fanciful pretensions of the Langue to be considered on an equality with what they persist, with wilful ignorance, in calling the Italian branch. Perhaps some of your readers may not have cognisance of this case. About the year 1800, a Portuguese commander named Coutook the estates in 1808 because his brothers tinho arrived in London, having in his possession were Roman Catholics could not be, for there was moneys of the Order to the amount of 2000. no law to hinder Catholics from inheriting; and, Before his death (which occurred soon after his in fact, John Law, who did inherit the estate, was arrival) by the advice of the Catholic Vicar Aposa Catholic. It is possible that F. J. W. Law's tolic of the London District, he deposited the elder brothers, being then in the service of France, money in the Bank of England to the credit of the and we being at the time at war with France, Order of St. John of Jerusalem. Neither prin- they might be looked on as alien enemies, and cipal nor interest of this deposit having been be thus, whether fairly or unfairly, passed over in claimed, it had, in the year 1840, accumulated to 1808. But this reason did not exist in 1828, and a respectable sum. In that year, the S. Council then the Marquis of Lauriston was the real heir, in Rome, being informed that the money was lying and should have been summoned, as, on an act of in the Bank of England to the credit of the Reli- naturalisation, which he could have easily got, gion, and unclaimed, made the necessary legal he could have held the property. Instead of this, demand for it. Upon proving themselves to be Francis J. W. Law, the last who held the Lauristhe representatives of the Sovereign Authority of ton estates, was unfortunately, in his old age, led the Order, the money was awarded, and paid to into a wrong belief regarding the pedigree, and them; not, however, without a fruitless opposi-induced to allow the questionable sale of the tion on the part of the Baron Moncorvo, Portu- Lauriston estate, and the division of the proceeds guese Minister to the English Court, who put in in 1828. a counterclaim to the money, on the plea that the depositor had been a Portuguese subject.

Now, my question is-Why did not the Langue seize this glorious opportunity of asserting their claim to be considered equal, or even superior, to the S. Council in Rome, as representative of the Order of St. John? But no, they were silent and made no sign; but allowed their rivals, the Italian branch, as they call them, to carry off the golden prize. Was it disinterested modesty on their part? or a consciousness that their claim to be held legitimate was of too delicate and fragile a nature to abide the rough sifting of a court of

law?

Having trespassed unconscionably on your valuable space, I will now conclude at once and for ever by apologising to AN OBSERVER for not reply ing to his particular query, which, in my opinion, is only calculated to draw attention away from the question immediately at issue; viz. the right of the Langue to be considered a legitimate branch of the Order of St. John. Perhaps HisTORICUS, who, as AN OBSERVER justly opines, is not a member of the Order, may be induced to reply to the difficulty propounded. J. J. W.

It should be observed that the late George Edmund Carruthers, Esq., son of the abovenamed Robert Carruthers, and grandson of Margaret Hay, reluctantly and doubtfully took the sum allotted to him (five hundred pounds) from the estate; but he refused to sign the indemnity which was sought to be imposed on those who shared in the division. The whole affair is still a question for the present Marquis of LaurisE. M. C..

ton.

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and lands of Lauriston, and gives a view of the castle :

"The lands of Lauriston," says, in 1794, the writer of the History, "lie immediately to the west of the Barony of Muirhouse, and rise by gradual ascent from the banks of the Forth. On the summit of this ascent stands the Castle of Lauriston, commanding, from its elevated situation, an extensive prospect, especially of the sea and the coast of Fife. The castle appears to have been erected towards the end of the 16th century."

This, and his own account of their subsequent splendour, hardly agree with J. M.'s depreciation

of the estate and Castle of Lauriston.

Δ.

Your correspondent J. M. asks, “Where there is proof of relationship between Jean Campbell, John Law's mother, and the Campbell family?" Will J. M. be pleased to weigh the value of these illustrations of the case:-In 1705 John Law came home to Scotland rich from the gaming tables of all the continent. He was safe in Edinburgh from the judgment still in force against him in England for killing Beau Wilson, who forced him to fight. His petition for a pardon is preserved in the public Record Office (Q. Anne, Domestic, 1708, or 6). In 1705 he tried hard to to carry his paper-money scheme through the Scottish parliament. It was rejected; but the Campbell voted for it, with some other Whigs. The tracts on the subject (2) are in the Advocates' Library in Edinburgh. They are subtle abridgments of his Money and Trade, published in 1705. He was defeated mainly by the efforts of Bank of England Paterson, always a powerful opponent to bubbles.

Again, in 1720, after Law's fatal success in the Mississippi bubble, he succeeded by the folly and knavery of his imitators in London, the Blounts, the Craggs, &c. &c. His great supporter then was Lord Islay, a Campbell, who wrote an introduction to a new edition of his works, published in London in 1720. Moreover, another Campbell was Lord Provost of Edinburgh, when the " "gude town" voted Law the freedom of the city, for which he snubbed them in a French letter, written nine months after the compliment was so rashly paid to John Law. The records of the city of Edinburgh are full of instructive papers on this

South Sea business. William Paterson was not living to expose the hollowness of Law's paper schemes. J. M. could not do a better thing for the cause of truth than to have those money records of Scotland published.

SEARCHER FOR THE TRUTH.

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swift, to assure himself that fest, the Welsh word he gives, really was a Welsh word. Now I find in my Welsh dictionary, ffest*, fast, ffestin, of active nature, ffestinio, ffestu, to hasten, words, of which two at least bear such a very suspicious resemblance to festinus and festino, that it seems to me at least as probable that the Welsh borrowed them from the Latin, as that accidentally very similar words have very similar meanings in the two languages. Welsh is a very old language, no doubt, but, like many very old languages, it is quite insufficient for modern requirements, and has therefore been obliged to borrow, and I expect that it has borrowed from English and other Thus, in the same page as fest, I find ffenestr, languages quite as much as it has given to them. window, ffiggs, figs, ffin, boundary, flam, flame, oc, fire-place, focus. I do not wish to say that all, or any of, these words are borrowed, for they may have had a common origin, still I should be sorry to quote them as pure Welsh. But, with regard to fast, there was no occasion, in the first instance at least, to appeal to Welsh, for in Icelandic and Danish fast = both firm and swift, whilst it may be questioned whether the German fast, almost, did not originally mean quickly, though Grimm refers it to fest, and comp. the Lat. firmus and ferme.

Wedgwood considers fast in its three meanings of firm, swift, abstinence from food, to be but one word, and I think his suggestion reasonable, as it occurred to me independently. Fast firm, solid, unbroken, uninterrupted, and hence we readily obtain the meaning of rapid in succession, and then that of rapid in motion. Comp. the Lat. continuo, immediately (which itself means with nothing between), uninterruptedly, with our continent (Germ. FESTland). So the Fr. pressé, in a hurry, de suite, lit. in (uninterrupted) succession= immediately. Comp. also à bâtons rompus, by fits and starts, interruptedly. Still the notion of rapidity may naturally also be borrowed from the opposite idea of looseness, want of connection, (sudden) separation, as in the Fr. incontinent, immediately, the Germ. auf einen, Losgehen, Losspringen, Losschiessen, to rush upon any one. And so a fast man is about equivalent to a loose fish. See my note on club, "N. & Q." 3rd S. i. 294.

Again, when one fasts, abstains from food, one merely practises continence, one holds oneself in, holds fast, restrains, one's appetite. Comp. the Germ. fassen, to hold, and the Goth. fastan, to hold, keep fast, and to fast. F. CHANCE.

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