Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 10.djvu/435

 10 s. x. OCT. 31, loos.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

359

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

A Survey of London. By John Stow. Reprinted from the Text of 1603, with Introduction and Notes by C. L. Kingsford. 2 vols. (Oxford, Clarendon Press.)

IT is pleasant to have presented to us at once what seems to be an accurate text of this invaluable piece of London topography, and careful and full annotations on it by a competent scholar. Readers of ' N. & Q.' will find these annotations rich in suggestions and unsolved riddles of all sorts. No available source of information seems to have been neglected by Mr. Kingsford in his attempt to verify or elucidate Stow's statements. We are especially glad to see in the Introduction an attempt to get together an account of all the MSS. which belonged to Stow at any period in his career. The editor does not exaggerate the services rendered to English literature by this indomitable antiquary. The separate indexes of persons, places, and sub- jects are unusually good, but we should be glad to know why index-makers always omit Proclamations in their list of headings. Proclamations had con- siderable importance in their day, and as there is no general collection of them published, every reference to them should be preserved. Stow is almost the only authority we have for the date of some of them, and his mention of them, therefore, has a special value. Mr. Kingsford notes carefully in an Appendix the variations between the 1603 edition, which he prints, and that of 1598, some of them containing very interesting personal memo- randa. The Introduction contains, in addition to a biography of Stow and an account of the scope of the 'Survey,' a large number of documents illustrating his life and a number of his dedica- tions, &c. We must not omit to pay a special tribute to Mr. Emery Walker's map of London c. 1600, showing the wards, &c., which has been drawn for this edition. The author and publishers have rendered a great service to lovers of London by this issue.

The Old-Time Parson. By P. H. Ditchfield, F.S.A.

(Methuen & Co.)

INCONTESTABLY Mr. Ditchfield has the pen of a ready and rapid writer. We have hardly done smiling over the eccentricities of the Parish Clerk before he invites us to join in a hearty laugh over the ways of his master. We shall not be doing him an injustice if we suggest that the object he pro- poses for himself is to amuse his readers rather than instruct them. Although the present volume appears as one of " The Antiquary's Books," the author aims at the role of popular anecdotist much more than that of serious antiquary. He has cer- tainly been successful in bringing together a large number of gossiping stories, chiefly modern, about the clergy, especially the Bishops (whom Mr. Ditchfield' includes among the Parsons). Many of the stories, it must be admitted, are "chest- nuts." We have here that venerable jest about the curate's egg which the Pan-Anglican Congress this summer unanimously refused to listen to, when a transatlantic divine attempted to retell it. We find also Temple's unsympathizing response about somebody's aunt, and other familiar stories which are not always accurately told. We decline,

therefore, to regard this entertaining volume as*- a bona fide attempt to write the his'tory of the- clergy from an antiquarian point of view. In this respect it falls short even of J. C. Jeaffre- son's 'Book about the Clergy,' which had some vogue thirty years ago. Mr. Ditchfield's definition of "Old-Time" must be rather peculiar, as he makes it come down to the end of the nineteenth century. Bishops Wilberforce, Stubbs, Temple y and Creighton, who figure largely in his pages, are hardly Old-Time Parsons.

Another thing that strikes us is that the selec- tion of typical clergy is not sufficiently representa- tive. If amusement is to be the chief object of the book, we ought not to look in vain for any notice of such quaint and facetious preachers as Andrewes and Thomas Adams ; and if we are to take in the moderns, surely Dean Burgon deserves a place among the originals. " The Bishop of Tuam, Ire- land," is no definition of a deceased prelate (p. 90) ; and the saying attributed to Archbishop Magee about "saving the soul of a tomtit" (p. 81) was really uttered by John Gregg, Bishop of Cork. Some stories, again, are entirely pointless. A certain bishop once discovered in the pulpit, to his dismay, that he had lost his sermon ; we turn the page for the denouement, and find this impotent conclu- sion : " but there is little doubt that he came through the ordeal fairly well " (p. 238).

An antiquary should not give us ostuarius for doorkeeper (p. 28 \ nor Robert as Langland's Christian name (p. 27), nor ton as the old English form of "town (p. 32), nor "sidesman" as a "corruption" of "synod's man" (p. 35). The date and source of the ancient plan of a manor given at p. 19 are not indicated ; neither is it noted that Archbishop Harsnett's epitaph is to be found at' Chigwell, Essex. The last line of the book is a misquotation of the old saying, "clerus Britan- nise stupor mundi," substituting "gloria" for " stupor."

Historical and Political Essays. By W. E. H.

Lecky. (Longmans & Co.)

THE Preface, signed " Elisabeth Lecky," explains- that the distinguished author did not often distract his attention from the book he was writing by giving addresses or contributing articles to reviews or magazines. Consequently, the number of such fugitive writings from his pen is small. But all that is given here is in style, and a certain deli- berate judgment, so far in advance of the average journalism of to-day that it amply deserves per- manent form. Lecky nowhere achieves brilliance, but there is evidence of solid thought everywhere,, and he expresses himself with a neatness which is refreshing. It is well-considered work, somewhat academic, perhaps, but none the worse for that in this age of violent and hurried writing.

There are several historical papers, but we prefer those which deal with persons. ' Carlyle's Message to his Age ' is an example of judicious summary enlightened by some personal opinions. It is recog- nized that the Sage of Chelsea wrote " much that is exaggerated, much that is one-sided, much that is- unwise," while his teaching was "a great moral tonic." ' Dean Milman ' is a charming paper, exhi- biting the essential broad-mindedness of the man, who suffered much for toleration's sake. ' Old-Age Pensions ' has a vivid interest for thinkers of to- day, and Lecky does well in calling attention alike to the enormous abuses of old Poor Law relief, and