Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/201

 10 S. XL FEB. 27, 1909.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

161

LONDON, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY ..'?, IW.'i.

CONTENTS. Xo. 270.

NOTES : Sir John Harington ami ' Nug- Antiquae,' 161 Robert Drury, 162 Inscriptions in Jerusalem, 163 Macaulay and Thorns, 165 Indian Names " Artificial " " Bilker"" Come to School "Johnson and Smith, 166.

QUERIES : Punch : The Beverage Lizards and Music Goethe's Conversations, 167 Semaphore Signalling Britannia as the National Emblem " The White Hart " Chinese Proverb in Burton's 'Anatomy' Gloucester- shire Worthies Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's Letters, 168 Islington Parish Registers Poems attributed to Dryden Jews in Fiction Gainsborough's Descendants Dodsley the Publisher Heathfleld, Sussex W. Bullock on Virginia " That's another pair of shoes " Thistle and Saint Canopied Pews Scrap Hager Alkali Castle Foulis Heraldic, 169 Stuart, Earl of Traquair Rut- land Ot way Bale Henry Ellison Dray ton on Valentine's Day Tasso's ' Aminta ' Luisa Sigea, 170.

REPLIES :-The Liquid N in English, 170 Eastry, Kent, 171 Gloucestershire Definition of a jentleman Billy Butler the Hunting Parson Mill at Gosport, Hants " Brokenselde," 172 Sneezing Superstition : Earburn Garlic: Onions for purifying Water -Wilbraham and Tabrahara, 173 Britten Diabolo Egypt as a Place- Name Neyte, Eybury, and Hyde, 174 " Good-Fors " -- American Genealogies Quotations Wanted -Wonders of the World, 175 "In Print" Arms of Roman Catholic Bishops " Baling" Mendez Pinto, 176 C. J. Auriol Parliamentary Banner Orkney Song Judge Gascoigne, 177 Glossaries to Waverley Novels "Kersey" City Fig Tree R. M. Atkinson Persian Translation, 178.

NOTES ON BOOKS : The Oxford Dictionary Upper Norwood Athenieum Record.

OBITUARY : Rev. J. Silvester Davies.

SIR JOHN HARINGTON AND ' NUG^E ANTIQUE.'

I HAVE been for some time collecting materials with a view to writing a book on the life and works of Sir John Harington, the translator of Ariosto and godson of Queen Elizabeth.

The volumes called ' Nugae Antiquae,' published in the eighteenth century by his descendant Henry Harington, have done much for his fame, and are rightly accepted as some of the most interesting human documents that throw light upon the last years of Queen Elizabeth and the early years of James I. the Shakespeare epoch. It is a curious fact that the first edition of ' Nugae Antiquae ' is not to be found in the wonderful British Museum Library. The earliest edition there is that of 1779, in three volumes 12mo. But the first volume of the first edition appeared in 1769, "printed for W. Frederick at Bath," and was followed by a second volume in 1775. Both these are in my possession. The 1769 volume is published without any editor's name, and the introduction ' to the Reader ' is ex- tremely apologetic, showing that young Mr.

Harington did not properly appreciate the historic and literary value of his ancestor's papers. He says :

' Though the following letters are not greatly interesting, they are originals, and may afford some degree of amusement to those who indulge an idle curiosity of this nature. The editor will make no further apology for troubling the public, but plead in his defence several precedents of this trifling kind which prompted him to trust to the reader's indulgence."

He also remarks that the letters have been transcribed " from very obscure and ill- written copies." The editor further shows youthful indiscretion in adding an Appendix of 22 pages, containing letters from a " Georgian" to his friend " Muly," supposed to be written from Bath and supplied by a London lady. They are lively imitations of the style of The Spectator and Goldsmith.

The 1775 volume is called vol. ii., and said to be " selected from authentic records " by Henry Harington, jun., A.B. of Queen's College, Oxon, and is dedicated to Lord Francis Seymour, Dean of Wells. It con- tains a much more interesting selection of letters than vol. i., and the apologetic intro- duction throws a little more light on the MS. sources : the editor says he obtained " the following pieces from different MSS. and at different times," and proceeds with a would-be-humorous depreciation of his work :

" Several were accidentally met with on examining old Family-Books whose contents were, as usual, truly miscellaneous ; the same leaf containing, on one side, a Letter of Political Intelligence ; and on the other an excellent Ointment for Kibed Heels or a sovereign balsam for Broken Shins. Here, gentle Reader, we beg leave to anticipate your merry remark, viz. that the Editor has preserved the worst side of the Leaf."

The corrected and revised edition in three volumes published in 1779 had a much better introduction to vol. i. by the same editor, who was now in orders, and Minor Canon of Norwich ; but vol. ii. has the old introductions put together, and gives no further information as to the MS. sources.

The last edition of ' Nugse Antiquae ' was published in 1804 in 2 vols., 8vo, and this collection was edited by Thomas Park, F.S.A., who acknowledges assistance from such competent scholars as Malone, Douce, and Person. He gives, however, no indica- tion that he has ever seen any of the MSS., or that he has made any inquiries or investiga- tions about them ; but he makes some judicious omissions, especially much of the poetry, which was found to have been printed in Tottell's ' Miscellany.'