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LONDON, SATURDAY, AUGUST 8, 1863.

CONTENTS.-No. 84.

NOTES:-The "Faerie Queene" Unveiled, 101-Letter from Sir Christopher Wren, 103-Old Churchwardens' Accounts, 104-Photo-lithography, Ib.- Ptolemy's Knowledge of Africa and the Sources of the Nile, &c., 105-Significant Names in Shakspeare, 106. MINOR NOTES:-Bibliographical Note: "Songe du Vergier" Longevity-Gib-Incomes of Peers in the latter Half of the Seventeenth Century-Yorkshire Words and Phrases -Old Almanacs Fly-Leaf Scribblings York House Water Gate, Buckingham Street, 107. QUERIES:- Zadkiel's Crystal Ball, 108-Dr. Dee's Cry

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stal-Albion and her White Roses-The Earliest Auction Sale of an Estate- Bochart Camden's "Britannia" Dr. Chamberlaque day and its Difficulties-" Dublin University Review". Fast "The Intrepid Magazine" - Robert Johnson's

-Chatham's Last Words-Domes

"Relations"-"Letters on Literature"- Notes of Sermons, 1754-5- Pike of Martin-The Primrose -- Regiomontanus The Sacrifice of Isaac Obscure Scottish

Saints - St. Diggle-Serious and Comical Essays-Thomas

Theta Seals, 109.

York

Simon QUERIES WITH ANSWERS: - Queen Elizabeth shire Poets - Passover William Billyng-Lady Eliza

--

beth Lee Quotations, 111. REPLIES:-Jacob's Staff, 113-Major-General Heane, 115 Exchequer or Exchecquer-Cheque, 116 — Modern Greek Law - Archbishop Leighton's Library at Dunblane - Pope and Senault-Sir Francis Drake- -Rooke Family Walsall-legged-Cowthorpe Oak - Wale, 117. Notes on Books, &c.

Nates.

THE "FAERIE QUEENE" UNVEILED.*

LETTER III.

Book VI. "The Legend of Sir Calidore, or of Courtesie."-Sir Philip Sidney is acknowledged to be the Knight of Courtesie, whose adventure is to pursue and bind in iron bands the Blatant Beast; and when we remember Philip's defence of his father, and that Sir Henry never again acted as Lord Deputy after his recall in 1578whilst Philip, in the same year, declined joining Prince Casimir in the Netherlands on his father representing to him "his own situation: the practises the information-the malevolent accusations that were assiduously devised against him-and the assistance which his presence would afford to him," we can readily understand how applicable to father and son is the remark of Sir Calidore to Artegall :

"But where ye ended have, now I begin
To tread an endless trace."-Book VI. i. 6.

Young Tristram, whom Calidore dubs his squire in the second canto, is probably a portrait of Philip-"seventeen years, but tall and fair of face."

Tristram was sent into the Land of Faerie

when ten years old; at which age Philip, son of the Lord President of Wales, was sent to Shrewsbury school.

• Concluded from "N. & Q." 3rd S. iv. 66.

As the Earl of Leicester had " a certain pleasant and winning majesty, both in his countenance and speech, which gained him for a time unbounded popularity," we may reasonably suspect that in the third canto Sir Calepine (a beautiful speaker) and Serena are intended for the Earl of Leicester and the Countess of Essex, who were married in September, 1578; but previously her Serene Highness had been grievously wounded by the venomous tooth of scandal, and Serena is wounded by the Blatant Beast, which Calidore pursues. The story of Serena falling into the hands of Salvages, and being rescued by Sir Calepine, probably refers to the disgrace of the earl and countess at court, when the queen was informed of their marriage by Simier in February or March, 1579.

In the fifth canto young Timias, who had completely recovered the favour of Belphoebe, has now three mighty enemies, Despight, Deceit, and Defamation, who set the Blatant Beast upon him, and he is wounded; these stanzas evidently allude to the envy and jealousy of the courtiers at Ralegh's high favour with the Queen at this early period of his career.

In the seventh canto Timias, completely cured of the wound from the Blatant Beast, in attempting to defend a lady riding on an ass from the ill-usage of two villains, Scorn and Disdain, is overpowered, bound with a rope, and driven and beaten like a slave, till he is rescued by Prince Arthur. The secret history of this story is singularly pleasing and imaginative; and Spenser, in the depicting of Cupid's anger, may have had in his recollection the punishment of Erona. lady on the ass, Mirabella, wondrous fair,

The

"Famous through all the Land of Faerie;
Though of mean parentage and kindred base,
Yet deckt with wondrous gifts of nature's grace,"
Book VI. vii. 28,-

is the poet's pastoral muse, or rather, the Shepherd's Calendar itself; on which poem Sidney, about Christmas, 1580, as President of the Areopagus, passed sentence in words almost identical with Spenser's:

"The Shepherd's Calendar hath much poetrie in his Eclogues, indeed worthie the reading if I be not deceived. That same framing of his stile to an old rustic language, I dare not allow."-Defence of Poesie.

To this criticism Spenser seems to allude, when he describes Disdain as

"Sib to great Orgoglio, which was slain

By Arthur, whenas Una's Knight he did maintain." Mirabella had now been wandering two whole years, undergoing the penalty imposed upon her by Cupid for her pride and cruelty to her lovers during the previous two years; and as the Shepherd's Calendar was composed in 1578, and published in 1579, and Sidney's criticism (Cupid's

r

sentence) was passed at Christmas, 1580, we may
suppose the present adventure occurred between
the autumn of 1582, and the spring of 1583; or,
in other words, Ralegh on his return from the
wars in Ireland takes the part of Spenser, in de- |
fending the rustic language of the Calendar, and
thereby exposes himself to the scorn and ridicule
of the classical Areopagites. Such appears to be
the simple solution of this amusing story, the
punishment of a flirt; but the commentators have
given a far different version thereof.

According to them, Mirabella, the lady in this
unlucky plight, is a satirical portrait of Rosalind,
the poet's early love; whilst the rough handling
of the gentle squire by Scorn and Disdain-as
well as his disgrace with Belphoebe, and his wound
from the Blatant Beast-are supposed to be allu-
sions to Ralegh's unfortunate amour, in 1592,
with Miss Elizabeth Throgmorton, whom he after-
wards married. But we may feel assured the
gentle Spenser, for gentleness was the distinguish-
ing trait of his character, as imagination of his
genius, was not so mean and malicious, so paltry
minded, as to hold up to scorn and ridicule a
rustic beauty for having jilted him fifteen or six-
teen years before; nor so ungrateful and worth-
less as to rejoice, page after page, in heaping
insults on his friend, making himself the basest
and most venomous of Blatant Beasts. Far from
Spenser were such thoughts when he composed
these beautiful tales, full of poetry and humour.
His mind was dwelling on a far distant land, and
on years long gone by-the happiest of his life
before his banishment to the wilds of Ireland,

from 1578 to 1584.

mutual friend of Harvey and Spenser, so intimately acquainted with the innermost thoughts of the latter; the writer of the Glosse for the Dreams as well as for the Calendar. Some say Edward Kerke, others King; and some, "that the force of guessing might no further go, imagine even the poet and the commentator the same person."

But how comes it that, to the elegant epistle prefixed to the Calendar, only the initials "E. K." are attached? with the suspicious date, "From my lodging at London, this tenth of April, 1579." Why does Spenser always speak of this bosomfriend as "E. K.," whilst he gives us the names of his other friends in full? There is certainly something mysterious in the case; and we can scarcely doubt "E. K." is Edmund Spenser, on comparing the following passages in the Glosse to April, and at the end of Colin Clout's come Home again:

The poet Stesichorus is said to have doted so much
upon Himera, "that in regard of her excellencie he
scorned and wrote against the beautie of Helena. For
which his presumptuous and unheedie hardinesse, he is
have lost both his eyes."-Glosse to April.
said by vengeance of the gods, thereat being offended, to

"And well I wote, that oft I heard it spoken,
How one, that fairest Helene did revile,
Through judgment of the gods to been ywroken,
Lost both his eyes."

Colin Clout's come Home again, 1. 919-922.
"E. K." also tells us, "Rosalinde is a fained
name; which, being well ordered, will bewray the
verie name of his love and mistresse, whom by
that name he coloureth." Consequently, when we
formed of the same letters, the corporal presence,
find that the words Rosalinde and Rondelais are
the flesh and blood of Rosalind, evanishes into a
roundelay; which, being a verse of difficult com-
position, becomes, in the figurative language of
the poet, a proud and scornful beauty. It should
be noted, Rosalind in the poem is everywhere
spelt Rosalind; but in the Glosse always with an

e- -Rosalinde; and also in the Argument to Janu

These lamentable misinterpretations, so injurious to the character of the poet, seem to have their origin in the overhasty impressions of one commentator, inconsiderately adopted by others. Ah me! Spenser, "my lovely boy," I sympathise with thee. Such was the sad fate of poor dear Footsteps on her first alighting in the Rich Strond of the great Cleopolis. The critical eye of Lon-ary, "a country Lasse, called Rosalinde." Spenser don, like its gaslight, bedimmed and bemisted by gives us a roundelay in August. a November fog, mistook the gentlest of maidens, the fairest of fairies, for a fiery Fury; and she was put on an ass as "a drunken idiot," led by the carle, silent Contempt, and bewhipped by the foole, loud-braying Scorne. Such a penalty was, is, and ever must be, paid by the offender against timehonoured prejudices and fixed opinions-be he a Galileo, a Harvey, a Hahnemann, or even the humble author of the Footsteps of Shakspere.

But let us have another look at the lovely Rosalind. Is she a reality, or a myth? On reading the Shepherd's Calendar, I confess I regarded her as the poet's pastoral muse; and even when "E. K." certifies to her identity, I was willing to believe Spenser was practising a joke on his friend. But who is "E. K.?"-the accomplished scholar, the

We must now return to Calidore whom we left, or rather Spenser did, in the third canto, pursuing the Blatant Beast. The Knight of Courtesie, after dales, through forests, and through plains"—at "great travel and toyle-through hills, through last, in the ninth canto, "hostes with Melibee and loves fayre Pastorell." In the tenth canto : — "Calidore sees the Graces daunce To Colin's melody: The whiles his Pastorell is led Into captivity."

In the next canto, Calidore recovers Pastorell from the Brigands; and in the twelfth

"Calidore doth the Blatant Beast
Subdue, and bind in bands."

In these four cantos we have a poetical history

of Sidney's life, from 1580 to 1584. Pastorella, the supposed daughter of old Melibée (Sir Francis Walsingham), is Sidney's Arcadian, or pastoral muse.* Her captivity among the Brigands may refer to the last three books of the Arcadia, which were finished probably in 1583; and "Colin's melody" refers to Spenser's return from Ireland, when he ravished Sidney's ears with his picture of Despair.

Spenser, when he wrote the fairy scene of the Graces dancing upon a hill with Colin's love for a fourth Grace, must have had in his recollection the song on Elisa in the Shepherd's Calendar, wherein he says of the lady :

"She shall be a Grace,

To fill the fourth place,

And reign with the rest in heaven."—April. And in the Glosse there is an account of the three Graces; of which the stanzas 22, 23, 24, in this tenth canto, are merely an amplification. (Additional evidence, and good, that "E. K." and Spenser are the same person.)

Nor need we wonder, that the fairy scene on the hill vanishes at the sight of Calidore: for, is he not the same as Cupid, Mirabella's judge? And was he not the President of the Areopagus, that censured the Shepherd's Calendar, wherein Colin's love, Rosalinde, is so highly praised? And who is Elisa, the fourth Grace? Is she not also Rosalinde? Like her she is of celestial originthe daughter of Syrinx and Pan; the oaten reed, the shepherd's pipe. And thus, whilst by the public Elisa is regarded as Queen Elizabeth, amongst private friends she would be Rosalinde, rondelais, rond-Elisa. Consequently, in the seventy-fourth sonnet of the Amoretti, the third Elizabeth must also be Rosalind: for how could the poet owe the graces of his mind to a lady whom he fell in love with in his fortieth year? But we can readily grant the said lady may be secretly alluded to, and complimented therein; but there appears no reason for a similar admission as regards the fourth Grace in this tenth canto, who is the love of Colin Clout "certes but a country lasse" and so was Rosalind.

But Mirabella is not Rosalinde; the one "is a gentlewoman of no meane house," the other "of meane parentage and kindred base," the one is the poet's muse, the other is simply the Shepherd's Calendar. In "E. K.'s" epistle, we see the nervous anxiety of the new poet for the success of his adventure, and his strong predilection for the rustic dialect.

We must now conclude with Calidore. His finding the Blatant Beast in a monastery is probably an allusion to Parsons the Jesuit, author of Leicester's Commonwealth, to which vile libel Sir

Hence we infer that by Stella, in the poem of Astrophel, was intended his more stately muse of chivalry.

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"Gentlemen,

"London, 12 May, 1705.

"I have perused yours of 9th to my self and Mr. Bateman, and find you'l never make a right use of any kindness, for wch reason you may expect less of mine for the future. You have been pd beforehand hitherto, but withtho' yu may always depend on what is right. I shall not out your better behaviour you shall not be pd so again, add to my last direction about the money, til that be fully complyd with, nor at present tell you the price charg'd to the Duke of Buckingham. As for the Stone sent to Greenwich, I know no risque you have run, nor of any proposed to you, so that you have no pretence to higher pay on that accot. 'Tis all one to me what yor Jury dos. It shall not alter any measures of mine except in endeavouring that the Tunnage-money y claim by a pretended Grant from the Crown, be disposed to a better purpose than you apply it to, you having no manner of right to it, as I shall easily make appear; and also recontempt of her authority: for tho' 'tis in your own power present to ye Queen your contesting her right, and your to be as ungrateful as you will, yet you must not think that your insolence will be always born with; and tho' you will not be sensible of the advantage you receive by taken from you, I believe you might find the want of 'em the present working of the Quarrys, yet, if they were in very little time; and you may be sure that Care will be taken both to maintain the Queen's Right, and that Such only be employed in the Quarry's as will work regularly and quietly; and submit to proper and reasonable directions, weh I leave yu to consider of, and am

"Your friend,

"CHR. WREN.

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OLD CHURCHWARDENS' ACCOUNTS.

These are very illustrative of the usages of the
times, and are often to be met with lying un-
cared for in a corner of the parish coffer; but they
well deserve to be looked after, as the following
extracts from Talaton Devon will
prove :

"1592. Recd for Ale solde, xx".
1594. Paide for Breade and Wine against Coronation
Days, xvd.

Paide to the Register for two Excommunica-
tions and the sealinge of the same, ij'.
1595. Paide for bread and wine for three wedinges, vid.
Paid for wine against John Drewe's weding, ijd.
1598. Paid for bread and wine against Pridew's mar-
riage, iiid.

1601. Payd for Bread and Wine against Thomas Fran-
cam's Weddinge, ijd.

Payd for Bread and Wine against John Mat-
thew's Weddinge, ii.

Paid for Bread and Wine for the Comm. on

Palme Sunday and the weeke followinge and
Easter Day, vij'.

Payd to Mr. Hill for new writtinge the Register
Book, vij'.

Payd for foure yeardes of Cloth to make the
Člarke a Surples, iiij. iiijd.

Payd for makeinge thereof, vjd.
Payd for our Dinner, xxijd.

Payd for mendinge the Piggorme of the 4th
Bell, vijd.

Payd for Leather to mende the Bell Coller, vjd.
Payd for a Winge and Nayles to mend the
Belles, vjd.

1602. Item, payd for Bread and Wine against William
Marker's Weding and Humfrye Pyle's Weding,

vd.

Payd for Bread and Wine for two Communions,
one at Michaelmas and the other at Chrismas,
iij. vjd.

The Leather and thonges to mend the Bell Col-
lers, ixd.

1610. Paid for Peter's Farthings, xd.

Item, paid to Robert Manley for making the
pigme for the fourth bell, xijd.
1613. It: the Charges that I was cityd for that there
ware no sentences of Scriptures upon the
Church Walles, iij. ijd."

It: to Broke the paynter for setting up of the
sentences of Scripture upon the Church Walles,
xvj..

The selling of ale brewed by the churchwardens, with malt contributed by the parishioners by a rate, was one way of raising money for the uses and repairs of the church.

"Peter's Farthings." What was this payment? It occurs again, and I have met with the same entry in other parish accounts. "Piggorme,' ""Pigme." What was this? In another parish (Woodbury) in 1537 I find it spelt Peggyn."

66

"1613. For Keyes and Ringes and mending the Piggens, vid.

iij Wages for toe wage the Great Bell Pigon, iij. May it not be the old French word pignon, and means pinion and pivot, by which the bell is suspended, now called the gudgeon?

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As one of the large body of amateurs who owe their knowledge of photography to the admirable days of the art, when it had not a journal of its papers upon the subject contributed in the early own, to the pages of "N. & Q." by Dr. Diamond, and many of those, whose names now figure so prominently in the photographic world, I would columns the following simple process for photosuggest the propriety of your preserving in your lithography recorded in The Times of Thursday, July 30:

"A curious communication was sent in last week to the Academy of Sciences by M. Morven, in which he describes a method of his for obtaining direct photographic impressions upon stone, and which he can afterwards print off. He first gives the stone a coating, applied in the dark, of a varnish composed of albumen and bi-chromate of ammonia. Upon this he lays the right side of the image to be reproduced, whether it be on glass, canvass, or paper, provided it be somewhat transparent. This done, he exposes the whole to the action of light for a space of time varying between 30 seconds and three minutes if in the sun, and between 10 and 25 minutes, if in the shade. He then takes off the original image, and washes his stone, first with soap and water, and then with pure water only, and immediately after inks it with the usual inking-roller. The image is already fixed, for it begins to show itself in black on a white ground. He now applies gumwater, lets the stone dry, which is done in a few minutes, and the operation is complete; copies may at once be struck off by the common lithographic process. The process may be explained thus:-The varnish has been fixed and rendered insoluble by the action of light wherever it could penetrate; but, on the contrary, all the parts of the varnish protected by the dark portions of the image still retain their solubility, and are therefore still liable to be acted upon by the soda and acid contained in the soap, of which they moreover retain a part of the substance. Hence the action produced on the stone is a combination of etching and lithography. The advantages of the process may be briefly summed up as follow:-Simplicity and rapidity in the operation, exactness in reproducing the design, no need of negative impressions on glass or paper, the positive original comes out positive, the original design or model is not spoilt during the process, and the cost is trifling, owing to the cheapness of the substances."-Galignani's Messenger.

My reason for this is obvious. The practice here described is so simple that, if it be as effective as it is described, no photographer, capable of producing a decent photograph, can now be under any difficulty in multiplying copies of it. Photography was wisely advocated in" N. & Q." quary. as of the greatest possible value to the antiHow that value will be increased by this simple process of multiplying photo-lithographic copies of views, documents, seals, &c. it

would be a waste of space to argue. I hope any correspondents who use M. Morven's process will give your readers the benefit of their experience. AMATEUR.

PTOLEMY'S KNOWLEDGE OF AFRICA AND THE SOURCES OF THE NILE,

AS A SPECIMEN OF THE TRANSLATION AND EXPLANATION OF THAT WRITER'S "GEOGRAPHICA."

Every map, representing any great portion of the earth's superficies, must necessarily be compounded of a number of special ones; a truth that will be deemed by no one unimportant who has ever occupied himself with Chartography: he will find its application for every atlas, whether constructed now or a thousand years back.

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The measurements of an engineer or the itineraries of the traveller give special maps; the combination of many such special maps to an entirety of the globe, is the problem of geography. Thus, Ptolemy, at the commencement of his work, says: Geographers need not necessarily be draftsmen; they only combine what has been previously delineated, and bring together by the aid of mathematics (μe@ódov μanuariks) the materials afforded them by the topographers. His task, therefore, is easy, where a sufficient number of special maps are laid before him."

The maps which Ptolemy constructed for Central Africa, though generally wrong, are so upon principle, and on a settled plan. When we have the clue to his principle, it will be found that his old map possesses more truth than his most enthusiastic admirers have ever contemplated. It will be, therefore, our object to follow him into his library, to watch over his mode of proceeding, to discover the rationale of his errors: for as on the one hand they proceed from the faults of projection, which more than anything have distorted his map, so on the other, from the want of knowledge in his commentators of this method, which has hitherto prevented them from properly understanding him.

The method then followed by Ptolemy, which he had copied from Martinus Tyrius, his predecessor, and which had been adopted by others, is as follows:- He carried the single maps, from which he constructed his general one, on to a globe, taking as his basis the astronomical observations already made by himself and others. After all his material was thus arranged, it was easy to fix to each the proper degree of latitude and longitude. As, however, a globe of the requisite size would be difficult to procure, Ptolemy gives various methods of drawing meridians and parallels upon a plane, that it may be similar to the globe, after the special maps are laid on to it. Unfortunately one radical error pervades Ptolemy's entire work: he takes the length of a

degree under the Equator too little by one-sixth, a fault by no means mended, if 500 stadia are reckoned to his degree instead of 600. Wherever possible, this error was corrected by astronomical observation; and it is just in such places we can observe the excellence of the materials with which he worked. But with the choice, he always prefers astronomical observations, and where they failed him, he was necessarily forced to depend upon the measurements and itineraries of others; though the views he thereby obtained were often in conflict with the recorded observations made previously in such cases he held these measurements as false, and proceeded to amend them by his own judgment.

:

It will, therefore, be necessary, in the following investigation, to ascertain what observations are his own and what proceed from his judgment exercised upon the opinion of others; and in doing so we will at present take his map of the course of the Nile, leaving other portions of Central Africa and the Niger to a translation of his entire work, which we hope to accomplish.

Following the course of the Nile in Ptolemy's works we find that, from Alexandria to Syene, it is pretty correctly laid down; and that occasional variations from its modern run are perhaps due more to the changes of its bed than to any fault of the geographer. From Syene to Meroe we observe generally all the bends the stream still pursues, but with a neglect of specialties for generals. The N form sinuosity, known already to Erastosthenes and other ancient writers, is truly and possibly better drawn than upon maps which were projected at the beginning of the present century.

The geographical latitude of Syene has, as is well known, been fixed by astronomical calculation.

Had Ptolemy, with the shortened degree mentioned above as his basis, and without astronomical correction, formed his map of the Upper Nile, he must soon have come too far South, and the difference must have been plainly perceptible at Erchoas (18° N. L.). On the way from Erchoas to Napata, this error was again rectified; though this latter place has a situation that is at least half a degree too low with reference to Syene. At Meroe, the error from this mode of computation would not be less than a degree, but in reality we do not find this supposition confirmed by inspection. Meroe and Erchoas are nearly in their right latitudes, and Napata much too far north. From this it follows, that the latitudinal observations in the eighth book on Napata and Meroe cannot both be taken from the same particular maps; one of them must have been from his own projection. Meroe has the best right to claim observations for its site, which Napata can scarcely expect, as it is almost half a degree wrong. Now,

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