a

MICHAEL LIVINGSTON (10 S. xii. 490). Michael Livingston of Bantaskine was kinsman and vassal of Alexander Livingston, Lord Almond, afterwards second Earl of Callendar, to whom M. L. addressed a long poem (1682) entitled Patronus Redux. With reference to this poem the following extract is taken from The Livingstons of Callendar and their Principal Cadets,' a family history privately printed in 1888: "His initials M. L. are only on the title-page, but at the end of the poem are some lines addressed to Michael Livingston of Pantasken upon the Panegyrick on the Earl of Callendar' by William Scott, which identifies the author. He is probably the same person as the Michael Livingston of Banteskine who together with one Robert Burn of Falkirk were defendants in an action

brought against them by the Earl of Linlithgow in March, 1700. He is also probably the same Michael Livingston who presented a poem entitled Albions Elegit,' &c., to the Duke of York in 1680."

AUTHORS OF QUOTATIONS WANTED (11 S. i. 50, 113).—It may be of interest to MR. DE VILLIERS to know that his quotation No. 1 is the first line of a distich used by the Paris printer Felix Balligaut in connexion with his printer's mark, of which a facsimile is given facing p. 101, of the Rev. W. Parr Greswell's Annals of Parisian Typography, London, 1818, 8vo. This is reproduced from his Ludolphi Vita Christi, printed at Paris, 1497. The lines referred to run as

follows:

Felix quem faciunt aliena pericula cautum Est fortunatus felix diuesque beatus.

JOHN HODGKIN.

After giving various forms of the proverb Tela prævisa minus nocent" (No. 4 among Mr. DE VILLIERS's quotations), I have come on a passage where it is worded in what is virtually the same way. Gilbertus Cognatus Nozerenus (=Gilbert

2

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MRS. MAHON, THE BIRD OF PARADISE " (10 S. ix. 170).-No one as yet has been able to tell me the date of the death of this notorious lady, who was the daughter of James Tilson of Pallis, King's County, and Gertrude, Countess of Kerry, and was born 15 April, 1752. In all probability she died later than 1808. The death of her son (who was born 18 Jan., 1771) is thus referred to in Gent. Mag. of February, 1791, p. 186 :—

"Lately at Tanjore, Mr. Tilson Mahon, of the cavalry in the service of the East India Company, son of Mrs. Mahon and grandson of the late Countess-dowager of Kerry."

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2

HORACE BLEACKLEY.

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22

think it most unlikely that the name is Celtic. COWES, ISLE OF WIGHT (11 S. i. 88).—I The ancient Cornish name Caraclowsein-Cowse" has nothing to do with it. This Cowse" represents the Cornish cōs, cūz, coys, which are explained in Williams's Cornish Dictionary as being late spellings of Corn. coid, "a wood," which is the same word as Welsh coed, a wood," and cognate with E. heath. We cannot connect a late Cornish form with ancient British. In a vast number of cases Celtic "origins of English words and names are utter delusions. I believe Cowes to be of English origin, though it can hardly be associated with a certain domestic quadruped. As we are not provided with old spellings, I can only give as a mere guess (to be proved or disproved) that it represents the A.-S. Cusan, gen. case of Cusa, a known personal name. If this is right, it means Cusa's place." There are certainly cases in which a place-name is of this form. For example, Sextons in Beds merely means Secrestain's place," as the Domesday Book spelling suggests; "Secrestain" being the old form of the word now spelt Sexton. As to the vowel-sound, the A.-S. cu is now cow.

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WALTER W. SKEAT.

As a small contribution on the interesting question of the etymology of Cowes raised by Y. T., the following points may be noted. In Jenner's Handbook of the Cornish Language,' p. 192, cos and coose (wood) are stated to be used as part of compound place-names.

In Cornish Celtic s often stands for an original d, and cos, coose, or cowse is equivalent to the Welsh coed (a wood).

It seems rather strange for the word to be used by itself as a place-name; but it may be worth noting in this connexion that Quat as well as the neighbouring parish of Quatford (both near Bridgnorth in Salop) have been equated with the Welsh coed. Whether this theory will bear investigation I cannot say.

In the name "Carac lowse in Cowse" lowse, grey, represents Welsh llwyd and Irish liath. W. J. P.

I have before me a map by John Speed, 1610, taken from an atlas, and on the west entrance of Newport Haven is marked "Westcowe Cast (i.e., Westcowe Castle), but not Cowes. If Y. T. does not possess this map (original) I shall be pleased to send it to him to look at, if he will kindly return it. I have another map from the same atlas, and it has the date 1610 printed HAWKES STRUGNELL, Commander R.N. The Royal, 68 and 69, Lancaster Gate, W.

on it.

The Cornish word for a wood, cowse, is identical with Welsh coed, as in the placename Bettws-y-Coed. From the same root comes the English heath, with a slight change of sense. The divergency in the last consonant of Cornish cowse and Welsh coed is due to the Cornish habit of softening final t to s. Compare, for example, the Cornish nance, so common in place-names, with the corresponding Welsh nant. We thus know all about the Cornish cowse, but whether Cowes in the Isle of Wight is derived from it or not-" God bless us all! that 's quite another thing," which I prefer to leave to others to decide. JAS. PLATT, Jun.

We are glad to be able to print one more communication from MR. PLATT'S pen. See ante, pp. 134, 140.]

ROCHECHOUART (11 S. i. 108).-The 'Dictionnaire de Noblesse,' quoting Les Grands Officiers de la Couronne,' t. iv. p. 649, says :"Aimery, seventh of the name, Vicomte de Rochechouart (son of Aimery the sixth Vicomte by Luce, Dame de Perasse), married Alix de Mortemart, and had Aimery the eighth Vicomte, who married Marguerite de Limoges, and carried on the

line.

Aimery the seventh Vicomte by Alix de Mortemart had a second son Foucault, Seigneur de Saint Germain (suivant un mémoire'). He was father of a son Gui de Rochechouart, who

married Sibilla de Vivonne, and had William, and Simon, Seigneur d'Availles." H. S. V.-W.

Aberystwyth.

"EARTH GOETH UPON EARTH” (11 S. i. 48, 116).—This is the opening line of the fourth of seven verses of an early English poem attached to a scroll in one of the sixteenthcentury fresco paintings in the Chapel of the Holy Cross at Stratford-on-Avon, commonly known as the Guild Chapel. (It is printed at length in Wheler's History of Stratford,' 1806, pp. 98-9.) The original, written in a neat Gothic letter, appears in a scene representing the martyrdom of Thomas à Becket, discovered during repairs to the chapel in 1804. Traces still remain, though most of the curious paintings there have since crumbled away. As the verse varies from those given by other correspondents, MISS MURRAY may like to have the rendering. It runs :—

Erth goth upon erth as man upon mowld,
Lyke as erth upon erth never goo schold,
Erth goth upon erth as glesteryng gold
And ytt schall erth unto erth rather then he
wold.

WM. JAGGARD.

ALVARY OR ALVERY: ALVEREDUS (10 S. xii. 309, 397, 416).-Alveredus and Alvredus were certainly the Latinized forms of the A.-S. Ælfred or Alfred, as suggested by B. B. at the second reference; but Alfred was by Dr. Round has pointed out that it was a no means exclusively an Anglo-Saxon name. favourite name in Brittany, and that after the Conquest it was borne in England by Bretons. Thus Juhel, the Domesday Lord of Totnes, was son of Alfred, and was succeeded by another Alfred ('Feudal England,* p. 327). Juhel, by the way, notwithstanding his distinctive Breton name, has been turned

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into a Norman by M. Léopold Delisle, who mistook Totenais 22 for a form of Toeni (Monthly Review, No. 9, p. 97). The name Alfred also occurs in Normandy; e.g., among the witnesses to a charter of Duke Richard II. (? A.D. 1026) is an Alfred the Vicomte -"Alveredus vicecomes " ('Calendar of Documents preserved in France,' No. 702).

Possibly the names Alvary and Alvery owe their origin to a mistranslation of Alveredus, the true equivalent of the Latin form having been forgotten. G. H. WHITE.

Lowestoft.

ROBERT PALTOCK, THE AUTHOR OF PETER WILKINS (10 S. xii. 286).—All that appears to be known of Paltock will be found in an article by Mr. W. Roberts on Peter Wilkins' in The Bookworm, vol. iii. 197-202 (1890). Paltock's authorship only came to light by accident in 1835, though 'Peter Wilkins was first published in 1750. Mr. A. H. Bullen was unable to add to the obtainable information when he edited a reprint in 1890; and Mr. Roberts concludes that Paltock was of Cornish origin, and may be the Robert Paltock who was buried at Ryme Church, Dorset, in 1767.

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W. B. H.

CHILDREN WITH THE SAME CHRISTIAN NAME (10 S. xii. 365; 11 S. i. 35, 79, 112).– In Sir Maxwell Lyte's Calendar of the Manuscripts at St. Paul's' in the Ninth Report of the Historical MSS. Commission, P. 23, Master Richard, Richard, and Richard, brothers," are named among the witnesses to a grant by the Dean and Chapter in or near 1170. On p. 12 we have "Ricardo Ruffo et altero Ricardo fratribus." The two are also named as witnesses to a grant to the church of St. Helen, about 1140, at p. 64.

Savile Club.

W. J. LOFTIE.

There is an instance in the family of Lord Gray of Scotland of children by the same father and mother, and living at the same time. bearing the same Christian name. The one was Patrick, 5th Lord Gray, eldest son, born 1538, died 1608, the other Sir Patrick Gray of Invergowrie, sixth son, who died 1606. Both were children of Patrick Gray of Buttergask, 4th Lord Gray, who died 1584. by his wife Marion, daughter of James, 4th Lord Ogilvy of Airlie (see vol. iv. of The Scots Peerage ').

Patrick, 4th Lord Gray, was the eldest son of Gilbert Gray of Buttergask, third son of Andrew, 2nd Lord (d. 1514), and second son by his second wife Elizabeth Stewart, daughter of Sir John Stewart of Balveny, afterwards Earl of Atholl (great-grandson to John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, son of Edward III.), by his wife Margaret, daughter of Archibald, 5th Earl of Douglas.

of

The descendants of Gilbert Gray Buttergask by the male line (of whom many are living) through Andrew Gray of Bullion, fifth son of Patrick 5th Lord Gray, and by the female line through Anna, eldest daughter of Andrew, 7th Lord Gray, have a very respectable antiquity. Their ancestry can be traced in unbroken lines back to Egbert (son of Cerdic), first king of Wessex, who died 836; Kenneth MacAlpin, first king over the Picts and Scots, died 859; William the Conqueror; and Hugh Capet, king of France, who died 996. Thus through Elizabeth Stewart (daughter of Sir John Stewart of Balveny and Margaret Douglas his wife) who was married to Andrew, 2nd Lord Gray, their descendants can trace a direct connexion with the royal families of England, Scotland, and France. PATRICK GRAY. Dundee.

That the same Christian name was often given to children of the same family is unquestionable, but more frequently when the first-named was dead. My experience is based upon Church records which have been examined by myself.

A year or two ago, when collecting information for my Croydon's More Ancient History,' &c., I found that, owing to an error of previous writers, it was stated that there had been two Vicars of Croydon named Samuel Fynche. Samuel Fynche, the vicar, who was Archbishop Whitgift's right-hand man in the building of the latter's hospital of the Holy Trinity, Croydon, had a son named Samuel. The first-named Samuel Fynche was collated by Archbishop Grindal in 1581, and my investigations show that he was re-presented to the living in 1603. He was married three times. By his first wife he had a son christened in 1582 Samuel, and by his third wife he had in addition a son who was also baptized Samuel, and by the first wife a son christened William, and by the third wife another son called William. His first wife had a daughter christened Elizabeth. who died in 1608; while a daughter by his third wife was also named Elizabeth, born in 1605. It may be men

Miscellaneous.

NOTES ON BOOKS. &c.

The Scottish Grey Friars. By William Moir Bryce. 2 vols. (William Green & Sons.) THESE handsome and well-printed volumes are of a sort especially adapted to give pleasure to the readers of N. & Q.,' consisting as they do of a clear and painstaking historical narrative of the career of the Scottish Franciscans, and of a volume of documents of all kinds, from wellknown Bulls to previously unprinted deeds and accounts, with some excellent, though for the most part familiar, illustrations. Let us first, before indicating the chief features of Mr. Bryce's

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work, ask where he obtained the word Observatine." Observant" we know, and "Observantine " we can understand without approving but "Observatine " cannot by any stretch of meaning be applied to an agent-it must be restricted to an object. The constant jar of such a barbarism spoils our pleasure in reading the book. Mycenas must be a misprint. Mr. Bryce has not confined himself to an account of the Scottish friars, but has written so much of the history of the Franciscan Order as was necessary to understand the problems which they, in common with others, had to solve, and their relation to the national and social life around them. The book shows wide reading, and in general sound judgment; and in the few cases where we should be disposed to differ from the author's statements, his authorities are always respectable, and generally accepted. His literary criticism and judgment are more personal and less valuable. Mr. Bryce shows, in fact, that true antiquarian cast of mind which delights in gathering everything that can throw a side-light on the subject under consideration, sometimes, it is true, at the cost of the clearness of outline and definiteness of statement attained by less encyclopædic, but more scientific writers.

The history of the Scottish Grey Friars begins with their arrival at Berwick in 1231, and closes with their dispersal and exile at the Reformation. It can be divided into two movements at two epochs. The first was a branch of the original expansion of the Order, which spread from England over the South of Scotland, and resulted in the foundation of eight convents (reduced to seven by the English annexation of Berwick), ending with the reign of Bruce. The secondcontinental in origin, and dating from the middle of the fifteenth century-was a branch of the Observant reformation of the Order, and founded nine convents in the large towns of the east coast of Scotland. The history of each of these convents is traced from foundation to dispersal and decay, with references to such documents as are known, and an account is then given of the Regular Tertiaries of Scotland, who had two nunneries-Aberdour and Dundee.

The remainder of the first volume is occupied by five chapters dealing with Franciscan theory and practice, very sensibly and calmly considered, in which the relation of the friars to the life around them is also described. The illustrations include four reproductions of charters and other deeds, and a number of works of art of general rather than Scottish interest, the only

ones, indeed, coming under that description being miniatures of Isabella, Duchess of Brittany, daughter of James I., and a view of the Aberdeen Friary Church in 1661.

are

The second volume (of documents) consists in the first place of such charters, sasines, accounts, &c., relating to the friaries, as are to be found in the General Register House at Edinburgh or in the respective burgh charter chests. These printed for the first time in the great majority of cases, as are also the interesting facsimiles of the Obituary Calendar of the Aberdeen Observants, to which Mr. Bryce adds a transliteration. From printed sources the author has collected many of the important Franciscan bulls, privileges, and rules, to some of which translations are appended; and he has reprinted Hay's Chronicle in full, a most interesting and valuable document. Anderson gives a scholarly account of some formerly belonging to the Franciscan Convent. MSS. in the library of Aberdeen University, A good index of its kind will help the reader to find his way about a work which resembles the "fine confused feeding." national dish in being

Mr.

There is no doubt that a much more scientific book on the same subject could have been produced from the same materials, but we doubt very much whether the result would have been so satisfactory to the general reader; while as for the scholar, since Mr. Bryce scrupulously gives his authorities, the fact that the texts are not critical leaves him no worse off than before, with the advantage of having his materials at hand. The Romance of Symbolism. By Sidney Heath. (Griffiths.)

So many books on symbolism have passed through our hands from time to time that we should have thought that little more remained to be said on a subject so well-worn, and we are not surprised to find that Mr. Heath has nothing new to say. Indeed, if we mistake not, he has not yet made himself acquainted with the immense literature which has gathered round the subject. He certainly makes no reference to it.

Confining himself to the ecclesiastical aspect. of it, as it bears upon Christian art and architecture, he writes for beginners, and explains the most elementary matters. At the same time, with a curious want of proportion, he assumes an amount of erudition on the part of his readers which few are likely to possess. He tells, e.g., of a strange abuse of images, and he thus begins his paragraph: Michael Balbus says in a letter to Ludovicus Pius " (p. 17). These worthies, their date and milieu, may be familiar to Mr. Heath, but he withholds from us all information. He explains at length what a nave and an aisle and a pix are; but when he registers" duplex” as "a very early symbol and one that plainly belongs to the pagan-Christian period" (p. 198), he vouchsafes no word to tell us what duplex" is.

a

In details where we can test the author's antiquarian and philological position, we frequently find him at fault. He holds to the exploded notion that the ancient Britons worshipped a sungod Bâl (as he spells it), in whose honour the Beltane fires were kindled (p. 34), and believes that the same deity may be traced in the constant recurrence of the word Bâl in Irish place-names (p. 36)-in the numerous Ballys, we suppose.