Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/298

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. XL MAK. 27, 1909

a definite article was, however, altogether a different thing : the ' Memoirs ' could be sold at sums to suit the tempers or pockets of the purchasers, according to the judgment of the author.

What a modern, much advertising pub- lisher the old man would have made ! This is evident from the three handbills which, brought together by some pious but unknown collector of Starkeyana, lie before me as I write. The first is a boldly printed quarto, dated 3 Oct., 1818, announcing the book as forthcoming on Tuesday, 6 Oct., 1818, "in Octavo Crown size, price 6d. ; on Fine Demy, Price Is." The next is a small octavo leaf announcing the production as " just published," with the information added that a few impressions on royal plate paper had been prepared, for subscribers only, with proofs of the portrait by T. Ranson, price Is. 6c?. Possibly the sales were not so large as had been anticipated, for .the third advertisement, a small quarto sheet of brown paper, contains what we are compelled to regard as a lure. " A malicious Report " so runs the announcement

" being now in Circulation, that the Pamphlet now publishing by W. Hall, containing Memoirs of my Life, is not genuine, I hereby beg the Liberty of contradicting the malevolent Assertion and to inform the Public, that the Pamphlet contains the true Statement of Facts, as written by myself, and that he, and no other, has my Authority to print and publish the same. Witness my Hand, this 9th Day of October, 1818. Benjamin Starkey."

The pamphlet itself concludes with the assertion that it is a true and exact copy of the author's life ; and this reiteration, apart from the question of advertisement trickery, makes one suspicious. Does the old man tell the truth about himself ? Well, not the whole truth for a certainty ; for the same careful collector to whom I have referred has enriched my copy of the ' Memoirs ' with a cutting from The Newcastle Courant for 26 Aug., 1815, which announces the deplor- able fact that

" on Monday last, Benjamin Starkey, a man well known in this town for the smoothness of his address, and the neatness of his written petitions for relief, was committed on a charge of forging a letter to enable a woman to obtain credit for shop goods."

The tale is continued by an inserted copy of the Assize Kalendar of the Prisoners in the Gaols of Newcastle and Northumberland " who are to take their trials on Thursday, August 15th, 1816," &c. The second item on the Kalendar refers to our author :

" Benjamin Starkey, aged 59, charged upon oath with having, on the 17th August last, un-

lawfully forged and counterfeited a certain letter,, with the name ' Dougall Robertson ' signed thereto, with intent to assist one Ann Wilson to defraud Thomas Atkinson and Joseph Spark, of certain of their goods and chattels."

Starkey makes no mention of this little occur- rence in his ' Memoirs.'

The portrait prefixed to the pamphlet is not pleasant to look upon : it suggests the spiritual and intellectual degradation of the original. Mary Lamb, recognizing this, recoiled from such a presentment of her old teacher, and refused to believe that even age and poverty could have made such a wreck of one who had always been " strik- ingly ugly."

These ' Memoirs ' of Starkey must ever remain a coveted item to the Lamb collector. Even in 1825 they were referred to as " very rare." Is there no room in these days of many reprints for the reissue, in a " Lamb Library," of the odd books and pamphlets bearing, directly or indirectly, upon Elia and his friends ? I think there is.

J. ROGERS REES.

SHAKESPEARIANA.

'ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL,' I. iii.. 66-9 :

Was this fair face the cause, quoth she, Why the Grecians sacked Troy ?

Fond done, done, fond

Was this King Riam's joy ?

' Cambridge Shakespeare ' (' Globe,' 11. 74-7)..

How should the third line of the stanza be finished ? for we may be sure that Shake- speare did not leave it unfinished. We will take our author himself for our guide.

In 'The Winter's Tale,' IV. iv. 449' (' Globe ' 1. 471), the Shepherd feelingly cries: To mingle faith with him ! Undone ! Undone !'

In ' Romeo and Juliet,' I. v. 22 (' Globe ' 1. 26), Capulet, telling of the day when he' could masquerade it, and please a lady's ear, exclaims, not once or twice only, but thrice,

'Tis gone ; 'tis gone ; 'tis gone.

And so in the above passage in ' All's Well that Ends Well,' accepting Heath's conjecture, " quoth he," to conclude the line and to make good the rime, and re- taining the comma of F. 1 and F. 2 after the second " done," I suppose the original: line to have been

Fond done, fond done, fond done, quoth he ;; Was this King Priam's joy !

or, as a variant,

Fond done, fond done, undone, quoth he. PHILIP PERRING..