Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/435

 10 s. XL MAY i, im] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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illustration, pictorial and literary, the scene of some 50,000 hangings during six hundred years. In 1783 new gallows in front of Newgate took the place of the Tyburn Tree. Incidentally he gives us some curious information as to " drawn [dragged along the ground], hanged, and quartered "and the "peine forte et dure," and all his details are, unlike those of the ordinary compiler, admirably "documented." Mr. Marks has also presented to us with knowledge and lucidity the social and legal conditions which led to Tyburn and its hideous story. Histories, as he remarks, do not pay much attention to the j subject a fact which we can endorse, for we have i looked at the three historical books nearest to our j hand all the work of well-known men and we fail to find in any of them the date at which capital punishment for stealing goods worth 5s. was abolished, a date surely of leading importance in these days, when history is not supposed to be confined to monarchs and battles. Mr. Marks gives us an idea of the conditions which made " barbarous rigour " against thieves and murderers the " first merit of a governor," as Freeman put it in his 'History of the Norman Conquest.'

In the section on 'The Hangman' our author remarks that "this great public officer has never received the homage due to him. In France the executioner is or was 'the executor of high works,' with us he has always been merely ' the coninon hangman.' Of the many instances of public ingratitude, this is perhaps the most scandalous." Dennis, the hangman of 1780, has been introduced by Dickens into ' Barnaby Rudge.' A few slang expressions are given derived from i Tyburn. We do not, however, find "in the cart," ! which turned up in a prominent trial a few months ; since, and is clearly traceable to the vehicle which generally figured in these executions.

The ' Annals ' under the headings of various years are full of interest, and include many curious cases, some of which are still obscure. The first recorded execution at Tyburn occurred in 1177. In | 124:2 we have an account and picture of Sir William cle Marisco drawn to the gallows. In 1523 we come on a case involving a claim for benefit of clergy which was objected to on the score of bigamy. In 1594 a Jew, Lopez, the Queen's physician, was executed, though probably innocent, for designing to poison Elizabeth. Commentators, we may add, have credited him with suggesting Shylock to Shakespeare. Under 1649 Mr. Marks has a tirade against Cromwell, whose statue should, he says, have been erected at Drogheda rather than outside the House of Commons. In 1670 we are introduced to the famous Claude Duval, highwayman ; and from this period onwards many of the knights of the road ended with a Tyburn tippet. Under 1695 we have a correction of Macaulay (a thing not so rare as is supposed), and some strong, but, we think, justifiable remarks concerning the suspen- sion of the Habeas Corpus Act. In 1783 "John Kelly was actually hanged for robbing another of sixpence-farthing." Mr. Marks speaks with proper indignation of the scandalous cruelties which were unaltered for a long term of years, and which form a remarkable tribute to the stupidity and backwardness of our legislation. Stare sniper antiquas mas is truly at once the delight and the defect of the English race.

A pleasant feature of the volume is the attention paid to literary and artistic as well as historical sources. Thus we come across the names of John

son, Hogarth, Richardson the novelist, Fielding, and Thackeray. Mr. Marks has written a work of permanent value, a real addition to the library of sound and interesting books. We have already noticed signs of that "conveyance" of matter (as usual, without acknowledgment) which is one of the few tributes awarded nowadays to good and interesting work. This operation is made easier from the fact that there is a capital Index.

WE have received from the Librarian of the Rylands Library two catalogues. The first is de- voted to original editions of the principal works of Milton, arranged in celebration of the Tercentenary of his birth. The titles in this, as far as they are given, are careful transcripts of the title-pages of the respective volumes. Prefixed is a diary of the principal events in the life of the poet.

The second Catalogue contains the works of Dante as shown in the main library in connexion with the visit of the members of the Manchester Dante Society. These will remain on view until October. Mr. Guppy states that " it is impossible- within the limits of a short prefatory note to con- vey anything like an adequate idea of the range of the collection from which the exhibits are selected/' The Library contains five manuscripts and nearly 6,000 printed volumes and pamphlets relating to Dante. As in the Milton Catalogue, the dates of the chief events in the life of Dante are given. Mr. Guppy gracefully thanks his colleagues, Mr. Guthrie Vine, Mr. Peacock, and Mr. Nuttall, for their help.

RECENT numbers of L'Intermediaire have some- thing to say. of the French prelates who took refuge in England during " the emigration." They also deal with the wreckers who are sup- posed to have thriven up to the end of the eigh- teenth century by felonious deeds committed on the coast of Brittany. If any document* describing the trial and punishment of criminals who actually lured vessels on to the rocks, or who murdered seafarers when they were flung ashore, do exist either in England or France, they ought to be published to settle a debated question once for all. That jetsam and flotsam should have been greedily seized by coast-dwellers, when they considered their claim to the gifts of the sea more ancient and more righteous than that of any prince or seigneur, is only natural ; but to take what wind and water bestow is one thing, and to live by the deliberate destruction of human life is another. It has scarcely yet been demonstrated that the people of Brittany and Cornwall were till lately heartless enough to make a regular trade of the murder of seafarers, whatever a scoundrel here or there may have done.

Among other subjects discussed in L'lnter- mediaire is the story of William Tell, of which a correspondent truly observes, " II y a des le"gendes qu'on ne tue pas." Whether the French fleur de Us was originally a flower or a toad is also debated ; and the use of the lighted towers or turrets known as death-lanterns receives further- attention. In the number for the 20th of Decem- ber last two tablecloths are mentioned, one, damasked with achievements of Marlborough while the other relates to Louis XV. Such cloths, referring to exploits on the Continent, are yet to be found among stores of old napery in England. If similar pieces are in existence displaying the sea-fiprhts of Great Britain, they ought to be cata- logued.