Various - Notes and Queries, Issue No. 61, December 28, 1850
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Various >> Notes and Queries, Issue No. 61, December 28, 1850
NOTES AND QUERIES:
A MEDIUM OF INTER-COMMUNICATION FOR LITERARY MEN, ARTISTS, ANTIQUARIES,
GENEALOGISTS, ETC.
* * * * *
"When found, make a note of."--CAPTAIN CUTTLE.
* * * * *
NO. 61.] SATURDAY, DECEMBER 28. 1850. [Price Threepence.
Stamped Edition 4d.
* * * * *{505}
CONTENTS.
NOTES:-- Page
Illustrations of Scottish Ballads, by Richard John King 505
The Red Hand--The Holt Family--Vincent Family 506
Vondel's Lucifer, by Janus Dousa 507
A Myth of Midridge 509
Folk Lore Miscellanies:--St. Thomas's Day--Black Doll
at Old Store-shops--Snake Charming--Mice as a
Medicine--"Many Nits, many Pits"--Swans hatched
during Thunder--Snakes--Pixies or Piskies--Straw
Necklaces--Breaking Judas' Bones 509
Local Rhymes and Proverbs of Devonshire 511
A Christmas Carol 513
A Note for little Boys 513
Similarity of Traditions 513
Pixey Legends 514
The Pool of the Black Hound 515
Popular Rhymes 515
Minor Notes:--"Passilodion" and "Berafrynde"--
Inscription on an Alms-dish--The Use of the French
Word "savez"--Job's Luck--The Assassination of
Mountfort in For folk Street, Strand--The Oldenburgh
Horn--Curious Custom--Kite--Epitaph on John
Randal--Playing Cards 515
QUERIES:--
Dragons: their Origin 517
John Sanderson, or the Cushion Dance; and Bab at the
Bowster 517
Did Bunyan know Hobbes? by J.H. Friswell 518
Minor Queries:--Boiling to Death--Meaning of
"Mocker"--"Away, let nought to love displeasing"
--Baron Muenchausen--"Sing Tantararara Rogues
all," &c.--Meaning of "Cauking" 519
REPLIES:--
The Wise Men of Gotham, by J.B. Colman 520
Replies to Minor Queries:--Master John Shorne--
Antiquity of Smoking--Meaning of the Word
"Thwaites"--Thomas Rogers of Horninger--Earl
of Roscommon--Parse--The Meaning of "Version"
--First Paper-mill in England--"Torn by Horses"
--Vineyards--Cardinal--Weights for Weighing
Coins--Umbrella--Croziers and Pastoral Staves 520
MISCELLANEOUS:--
Notes on Books, Sales, Catalogues, &c. 523
Notices to Correspondents 524
Advertisements 524
* * * * *
NOTES.
ILLUSTRATIONS OF SCOTTISH BALLADS.
In the ballad of "Annan Water" (_Border Minstrelsy_, vol. iii.) is the
following verse:--
"O he has pour'd aff his dapperpy coat,
The silver buttons glanced bonny;
The waistcoat bursted aff his breast,
He was sae full of melancholy."
A very unexpected effect of sorrow, but one that does not seem to be
unprecedented. "A plague of sighing and grief," says Falstaff. "It blows
a man up like a bladder."
A remarkable illustration of Falstaff's assertion, and of the Scottish
ballad, is to be found in this _Saga of Egil Skallagrimson_. Bodvar, the
son of Egil, was wrecked on the coast of Iceland. His body was thrown up
by the waves near Einarsness, where Egil found it, and buried it in the
tomb of his father Skallagrim. The _Saga_ continues thus:--
"After that, Egil rode home to Borgar; and when he came there, he
went straightway into the locked chamber where he was wont to sleep;
and there he laid him down, and shot forth the bolt. No man dared
speak a word to him. And thus it is said that Egil was clad when he
laid Bodvar in the tomb. His hose were bound fast about his legs,
and he had on a red linen kirtle, narrow above, and tied with
strings at the sides. And men say that his body swelled so greatly
that his kirtle burst from off him, and so did his hose."--P. 602.
It is well known that the subjects of many ballads are common to
Scotland, and to the countries of Northern Europe. Thus, the fine old
"Douglas Tragedy," the scene of which is pointed out at Blackhouse
Tower, on the Yarrow, is equally localised in Denmark:
"Seven large stones," says Sir Walter, "erected upon the
neighbouring heights of Blackhouse, are shown as marking the spot
where the seven brethren were slain; and the Douglas Burn is avowed
to have been the stream at which the lovers stopped to drink; so
minute is tradition in ascertaining, the scene of a tragical tale,
which, considering, the rude state of former times, had probably
foundation in some real event."
The corresponding Danish ballad, however, that of "Ribolt and Guldborg,"
which has been translated by Mr. Jamieson, is not less minute in
pointing out the scene of action. The origin of ballads, which are thus
widely spread, must probably be sought in very high antiquity; and we
cannot wonder if we find them undergoing considerable {506} change in
the passage from one country to another. At least the "Douglas Tragedy"
betrays one very singular mark of having lost something of the original.
In "Ribolt and Guldborg," when the lady's brothers have all but
overtaken the fugitives, the knight addresses her thus:
"Light down, Guldborg, my lady dear,
And hald our steeds lay the renyes here.
And e'en sae be that ye see me fa'
Be sure that ye never upon me ca';
And e'en sae be that ye see me bleed,
Be sure that ye name na' me till dead."
Ribolt kills her father and her two eldest brothers, and then Guldborg
can no longer restrain herself:
"Hald, hald, my Ribolt, dearest mine,
Now belt thy brand, for its 'mair nor time.
My youngest brother ye spare, O spare,
To my mither the dowie news to bear."
But she has broken her lover's mysterious caution, and he is mortally
wounded in consequence:
"When Ribolt's name she named that stound,
'Twas then that he gat his deadly wound."
In the Scottish ballad, no such caution is given; nor is the lady's
calling on her lover's name at all alluded to as being the cause of his
death. It is so, however, as in the Danish version:
"She held his steed in her milk-white hand,
And never shed one tear,
Until that she saw her seven brethren fa',
And her father hard fighting, who loved her so dear.
"O hold your hand, Lord William, she said,
For your strokes they are wondrous sair;
True lovers I can get many a ane,
But a father I can never get mair."
There is no note in the _Kaempe Viser_, says Mr. Jamieson, on this
subject; nor does he attempt to explain it himself. It has, however, a
clear reference to a very curious Northern superstition.
Thorkelin, in the essay on the Berserkir, appended to his edition of the
_Kristni-Saga_, tells us that an old name of the Berserk frenzy was
_hamremmi_, _i.e._, strength acquired from another or strange body,
because it was anciently believed that the persons who were liable to
this frenzy were mysteriously endowed, during its accesses, with a
strange body of unearthly strength. If, however, the Berserk was called
on by his own name, he lost his mysterious form, and his ordinary
strength alone remained. Thus it happens in the _Svarfdaela Saga:_
"Gris called aloud to Klanfi, and said, 'Klanfi, Klanfi! keep a fair
measure,' and instantly the strength which Klanfi had got in his
rage, failed him; so that now he could not even lift the beam with
which he had been fighting."
It is clear, therefore, continues Thorkelin, that the state of men
labouring under the Berserk frenzy was held by some, at least, to
resemble that of those, who, whilst their own body lay at home
apparently dead or asleep, wandered under other forms into distant
places and countries. Such wanderings were called _hamfarir_ by the old
northmen; and were held to be only capable of performance by those who
had attained the very utmost skill in magic.
RICHARD JOHN KING.
* * * * *
THE RED HAND.--THE HOLT FAMILY.
(Vol. ii., pp. 248. 451.)
Your correspondent ESTE, in allusion to the arms of the Holt
family, in a window of the church of Aston-juxta-Birmingham, refers to
the tradition that one of the family "murdered his cook, and was
afterwards compelled to adopt the red hand in his arms." Este is
perfectly correct in his concise but comprehensive particulars. That
which, by the illiterate, is termed "the bloody hand," and by them
reputed as an abatement of honour, is nothing more than the "Ulster
badge" of dignity. The tradition adds, that Sir Thomas Holt murdered the
cook in a cellar, at the old family mansion, by "running him through
with a spit," and afterwards buried him beneath the spot where the
tragedy was enacted. I merely revert to the subject, because, within the
last three months, the ancient family residence, where the murder is
said to have been committed, has been levelled with the ground; and
among persons who from their position in society might be supposed to be
better informed, considerable anxiety has been expressed to ascertain
whether any portion of the skeleton of the murdered cook has been
discovered beneath the flooring of the cellar, which tradition, fomented
by illiterate gossip, pointed out as the place of his interment. Your
correspondents would confer a heraldic benefit if they would point out
other instances--which I believe to exist--where family reputation has
been damaged by similar ignorance in heraldic interpretation.
The ancient family residence to which I have referred was situated at
Duddeston, a hamlet adjoining Birmingham. Here the Holts resided until
May, 1631, when Sir Thomas took up his abode at Ashton Hall, a noble
structure in the Elizabethan style of architecture, which, according to
a contemporary inscription, was commenced in April, 1618, and completed
in 1635. Sir Thomas was a decided royalist, and maintained his
allegiance to his sovereign, although the men of Birmingham were
notorious for their disaffection, and the neighbouring garrison of
Edgbaston was occupied by Parliamentarian troops. When Charles I., of
glorious or unhappy memory, was on his way from Shrewsbury to the
important battle of Edgehill, {507} on the confines of Warwickshire, he
remained with Sir Thomas, as his guest, from the 15th to the 17th of
October (vide Mauley's _Iter Carolinum_, Gutch's _Collectanea_, vol. ii.
p. 425.); and a closet is still pointed out to the visitor where he is
said to have been concealed. A neighbouring eminence is to the present
day called "King's Standing," from the fact of the unhappy monarch
having stood thereon whilst addressing his troops. By his acts of
loyalty, Sir Thomas Holt acquired the hostility of his rebellious
neighbours; and accordingly we learn that on the 18th of December, 1643,
he had recourse to Colonel Leveson, who "put forty muskettiers into the
house" to avert impending dangers; but eight days afterwards, on the
26th of December, "the rebels, 1,200 strong, assaulted it, and the day
following tooke it, kil'd 12, and ye rest made prisoners, though w'th
losse of 60 of themselves." (Vide Dugdale's _Diary_, edited by Hamper,
4to. p. 57.) The grand staircase, deservedly so entitled, bears evident
marks of the injury occasioned at this period, and an offending
cannon-ball is still preserved.
Edward, the son and heir of Sir Thomas, died at Oxford, on the 28th
August, 1643, and was buried in Christ Church. He was an ardent
supporter of the king. The old baronet was selected as ambassador to
Spain by Charles I., but was excused on account of his infirmities. He
died A.D. 1654, in the eighty-third year of his age. His excellence and
benevolence of character would afford presumptive evidence of the
falsehood of the tradition, if it were not totally exploded by the
absurdity of the hypothesis upon which it is grounded. Sir Thomas was
succeeded in the baronetcy by his grandson, Robert, who in compliance
with his will built an almshouse or hospital for five men and five
women. It is unnecessary to pursue the family further, excepting to
state that nearly at the close of the last century the entail was cut
off: the family is now unknown in the neighbourhood, excepting in its
collateral branches, and the hall has passed into the possession of
strangers. Its last occupant was James Watt, Esq., son of the eminent
mechanical philosopher. He died about two years ago, and the venerable
mansion remains tenantless.
With reference to the ancient family residence of the Holts, at
Duddeston, it will be sufficient to observe, that in the middle of the
last century the house and grounds were converted into a tavern and
pleasure gardens, under the metropolitan title of Vauxhall: and for a
century they continued to afford healthful recreation and scenic
amusement to the busy inhabitants of Birmingham. The amazing increase in
the size and population of the town has at length demanded this
interesting site for building purposes. Within the last three months the
house and gardens have been entirely dismantled, a range of building has
already been erected, and old Vauxhall is now numbered amongst the
things that were.
J. GOODWIN.
Birmingham.
_"Bloody Hands at Stoke d'Abernon, Surrey._--The legends of Sir Richard
Baker (Vol. ii., pp. 67. 244.) and of a member of the Holt family (Vol.
ii., p. 451.) recall to my mind one somewhat similar, connected with a
monument in the church of Stoke d'Abernon, Surrey, the appearance of a
"bloody hand" upon which was thus accounted for to me:--
"Two young brothers of the family of Vincent, the elder of whom had
just come into possession of the estate, were out shooting on
Fairmile Common, about two miles from the village; they had put up
several birds, but had not been able to get a single shot, when the
elder swore with an oath that he would fire at whatever they next
met with. They had not gone much further before the miller of a mill
near at hand (and which is still standing) passed them, and made
some trifling remark. As soon as he had got by, the younger brother
jokingly reminded the elder of his oath, whereupon the latter
immediately fired at the miller, who fell dead upon the spot. Young
Vincent escaped to his home, and by the influence of his family,
backed by large sums of money, no effective steps were taken to
apprehend him, and he was concealed in the 'Nunnery' on his estate
for some years, when death put a period to the insupportable anguish
of his mind. To commemorate his rash act and his untimely death,
this 'bloody hand' was placed on his monument."
So runs the story as far as I remember; the date I cannot recollect. The
legend was told me after I had left the church, and I had paid no
particular attention to the monument; but I thought at the time that the
hand might be only the Ulster badge. I shall be obliged to any of your
readers who will throw further light upon this matter. A pilgrimage to
Stoke d'Abernon, whose church contains the earliest known brass in
England, would not be uninteresting even at this season of the year.
ARUN.
* * * * *
VONDEL'S LUCIFER.
I have to complain of injustice done by a correspondent of "NOTES
AND QUERIES," to the Dutch poet Vondel. To the question mooted by
F. (Vol. i. p. 142.), whether my countryman's _Lucifer_ has ever been
translated into English, Hermes answers by a passage taken from the
_Foreign Quarterly Review_ for April, 1829; and subjoins a list of the
_dramatis personae_ "given from the _original Dutch_ before him. The
tragedy itself is condensed by your correspondent into a simple "&c."
Now, if HERMES, instead of referring to a stale review for a
comparison between Vondel's tragedy and the _Paradise Lost_, without
showing by _any_ proof that Milton's justly renowned epic {508} is
indeed superior to this, one of the Dutch poet's masterpiece--if
HERMES, being, as I conclude from his own words, conversant
with the language of _our_ Shakspeare, had taken pains to _read
Lucifer_, he would not have repeated a statement unfavourable to
Vondel's poetical genius. I, for my part, will _not_ hazard a judgment
on poems so different and yet so alike, I will _not_ sneer at Milton's
demon-gods of Olympus, nor laugh at "their artillery discharged in the
daylight of heaven;" for such instances of bad taste are to be
considered as clouds setting off the glories of the whole; but _this_ I
will say, that Vondel wrote his _Lucifer_ in 1654, the sixty-seventh of
his life, while Milton's _Paradise Lost_ was composed four years later.
The honour of precedence, in time, at least, belongs to my countryman.
All the odds were against the British poet's competitor, if one who
wrote before him may be so called; for, while Milton enjoyed every
privilege of a sound classical education, Vondel had still to begin a
course of study when more than twenty-six years of age; and, while the
Dutch poet told the price of homely stockings to prosaic burghers, the
writer of _Paradise Lost_ was speaking the language of Torquato Tasso in
the country enraptured by the first sight of _la divina comedia_.
I am no friend of polemical writing, and I believe the less we see of it
in your friendly periodical, the better it is; but still I _must_
protest against such copying of partially-written judgments, when good
information can be got. I say not by stretching out a hand, for the book
was already opened by your correspondent--but alone by using one's eyes
and turning over a leaf or two. Else, why did HERMES learn the
Dutch language? I ask your subscribers if the following verses are
_weak_, and if they would not have done honour to the English Vondel?
CHORUS OF ANGELS.
(From _Lucifer_.)
"Who sits above heaven's heights sublime,
Yet fills the grave's profoundest place,
Beyond eternity, or time,
Or the vast round of viewless space:
Who on Himself alone depends--
Immortal--glorious--but unseen--
And in his mighty being blends
What rolls around or flows within.
Of all we know not--all we know--
Prime source and origin--a sea,
Whose waters pour'd on earth below
Wake blessing's brightest radiancy.
'Tis power, love, wisdom, first exalted
And waken'd from oblivion's birth;
Yon starry arch--yon palace, vaulted--
Yon heaven of heavens, to smile on earth.
From his resplendent majesty
We shade us 'neath our sheltering wings,
While awe-inspired, and tremblingly
We praise the glorious King of Kings,
With sight and sense confused and dim;
O name--describe the Lord of Lords,
The seraph's praise shall hallow Him;--
Or is the theme too vast for words?"
RESPONSE.
"'Tis God! who pours the living glow
Of light, creation's fountain-head:
Forgive the praise--too mean and low--
Or from the living or the dead.
No tongue thy peerless name hath spoken,
No space can hold that awful name;
The aspiring spirit's wing is broken;--
Thou wilt be, wert, and art the same!
Language is dumb. Imagination,
Knowledge, and science, helpless fall;
They are irreverent profanation,
And thou, O God! art all in all.
How vain on such a thought to dwell!
Who knows Thee--Thee the All-unknown?
Can angels be thy oracle,
Who art--who art Thyself alone?
None, none can trace Thy course sublime,
For none can catch a ray from Thee,
The splendour and the source of time--
The Eternal of eternity.
Thy light of light outpour'd conveys
Salvation in its flight elysian,
Brighter than e'en Thy mercy's rays;
But vainly would our feeble vision
Aspire to Thee. From day to day
Age steals on us, but meets thee never;
Thy power is life's support and stay--
We praise thee, sing thee, Lord! for ever."
CHORUS.
"Holy, holy, holy! Praise--
Praise be His in every land;
Safety in His presence stays;
Sacred is His high command!"
Dr. Bowring's version,--though a good one, if the difficulty be
considered of giving back a piece of poetry, whose every word is a poem
in itself, and by whose rhyme and accentuation a feeling of
indescribable awe is instilled into the most fastidious reader's
mind,--Dr. Bowring's version is but a feeble reverberation of the holy
fire pervading our Dutch poet's anthem. But still there rests enough in
his copy to give one a high idea of the original. I borrow the same
Englishman's words when I add:--
"The criticism that instructs, even though it instructs severely, is
most salutary and most valuable. It is of the criticism that
insults, and while it insults, informs not, that we have a right to
complain."--_Batavian Anthology_, p. 6.
JANUS DOUSA.
Manpadt House.
* * * * *{509}
A MYTH OF MIDRIDGE;
_Or, A Story anent a witless Wight's Adventures with the Midridge
Fairies in the Bishoprick of Durham; now more than two Centuries
ago._
Talking about fairies the other day to a nearly Octogenarian female
neighbour, I asked, had she ever seen one in her youthful days. Her
answer was in the negative; "but," quoth she, "I've heard my grandmother
tell a story, that Midridge (near Auckland) was a great place for
fairies when she was a child, and for many long years after that." A
rather lofty hill, only a short distance from the village, was their
chief place of resort, and around it they used to dance, not by dozens,
but by hundreds, when the gloaming began to show itself of the summer
nights. Occasionally a villager used to visit the scene of their gambols
in order to catch if it were but a passing glance of the tiny folks,
dressed in their vestments of green, as delicate as the thread of the
gossamer: for well knew the lass so favoured, that ere the current year
had disappeared, she would have become the happy wife of the object of
her only love; and also, as well ken'd the lucky lad that he too would
get a weel tochered lassie, long afore his brow became wrinkled with
age, or the snow-white blossoms had begun to bud forth upon his pate.
Woe to those, however, who dared to come by twos or by threes, with
inquisitive and curious eye, within the bounds of their domain; for if
caught, or only the eye of a fairy fell upon them, ill was sure to
betide them through life. Still more awful, however, was the result if
any were so rash as to address them, either in plain prose or rustic
rhyme. The last instance of their being spoken to, is thus still handed
down by tradition:--''Twas on a beautifully clear evening in the month
of August, when the last sheaf had crowned the last stack in their
master's hagyard, and after calling the "harvest home," the daytale-men
and household servants were enjoying themselves over massive pewter
quarts foaming over with strong beer, that the subject of the evening's
conversation at last turned upon the fairies of the neighbouring hill,
and each related his oft-told tale which he had learned by rote from the
lips of some parish grandame. At last the senior of the mirthful party
proposed to a youthful mate of his, who had dared to doubt even the
existence of such creatures, that he durst not go to the hill, mounted
on his master's best palfrey, and call aloud, at the full extent of his
voice, the following rhymes:
"Rise little Lads,
Wi' your iron gads,
And set the Lad o' Midridge hame."
Tam o' Shanter-like, elated with the contents of the pewter vessels, he
nothing either feared or doubted, and off went the lad to the fairy
hill; so, being arrived at the base, he was nothing loth to extend his
voice to its utmost powers in giving utterance to the above invitatory
verses. Scarcely had the last words escaped his lips ere he was nearly
surrounded by many hundreds of the little folks, who are ever ready to
revenge, with the infliction of the most dreadful punishment, every
attempt at insult. The most robust of the fairies, who I take to have
been Oberon, their king, wielding an enormous javelin, thus, also in
rhymes equally rough, rude, and rustic, addressed the witless wight:
"Silly Willy, mount thy filly;
And if it isn't weel corn'd and fed,
I'll ha' thee afore thou gets hame to thy Midridge bed."
