Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 12.djvu/450

 370

NOTES AND QUERIES. [io 8. xii. NOV. e, im

It is painful in reading this work to see the animus with which he regards his gifted grandfather. Thanks, however, to the im- portant revelation made by Mr. Richard Edgcumbe in his book just published by Mr. John Murray, ' Byron : the Last Phase,' the whole secret stands revealed, and instead of Lord Lovelace's ' Astarte ' being, as he called it, a " fragment of truth," we may now regard it as a fragment of fiction.

In ' N. & Q.' of the 9th of October, 1869 (4 S. iv. 308), is a review of a book published by Hotten, and entitled ' The True Story of Lord and Lady Byron as told by Lord Macaulay, Thomas Moore, Leigh Hunt, Thomas Campbell, the Countess of Blessing- ton, Lord Lindsay, the Countess Guiccioli, by Lady Byron, and by the Poet himself, in Answer to Mrs. Beecher Stowe.' The introduction gives an account of the version of Mrs. Stowe's story published by her in America, and of the passages of it omitted in the English edition.

Another work is noticed on the 16th of the same month (p. 328) : ' Byron painted by his Compeers ; or, All about Lord Byron from his Marriage to his Death, as given in various Newspapers of the Day ' :

" This little pamphlet contains many interesting particulars, from the newspapers of the time, of Byron's marriage, separation, and death. The extracts from The Morning Chronicle, more par- ticularly the correspondence between Percy and Sir Ralph Noel, are not without special interest at the present moment."

JOHN COLLINS FRANCIS.

On 25 Sept., 1869, ' N. & Q.' printed (4 S. iv. 250) an unpublished letter from Byron to his friend the Hon. Douglas Kinnaird, contributed by F. C. H[usenbeth], The first part of the editorial note appended may well be repeated :

"We cannot print the foregoing letter without taking the opportunity which it affords of pro- testing against the unjustifiable step taken by Mrs. Stowe in publishing what she calls, but what we are sure is NOT, The True Story of Lady Byron's Life.' "

The Sphere of 20 Jan., 1906, quotes The Atlantic Monthly as well as Macmillarts Magazine. R. J. FYNMOBE.

Sandgate.

Mrs. Beecher Stowe published ' The True Story of Lord Byron' in The Atlantic Monthly for September, 1869. According to her biographer, Annie Fields, Dr. Holmes wrote to Lothrop Motley : " Mr. Fields was absent in Europe, and his sub-editor, fearing to lose Mrs. Stowe as a contributor altogether, assented to her request to print

the Byron paper." Elsewhere he remarked that the article caused " the Byron whirl- wind, which began here and swiftly travelled across the Atlantic." W. A. H.

Messrs. Sampson Low, Son & Marston published in 1870 ' Lady Byron Vindicated : a History of the Byron Controversy from its Beginning in 1816 to the Present Time,' by Harriet Beecher Stowe. This volume, which gives in one of its several Appendixes the text of Mrs. Stowe's original article in The Atlantic Monthly, should answer DR. MAITLAND'S query. F. J. HYTCH.

See also 'The Stowe-Byron Controversy: a Complete Resume,' by the editor of Once a Week, 1869. WM. H. PEET.

[MR. A. R. BAYLEY and WINDAB also thanked for replies. ]

WORDS AND PHRASES IN OLD AMERICAN NEWSPAPERS (10 S. xii. 107, 270). Frank- lin.- May I be allowed to remark that English scholars should observe great caution in attempting to explain American- isms ? Not all Americanisms are sur- vivals from old English usage. MR. MAC- MICHAEL'S theory in regard to Lowell's ' ' franklin ' ' is ingenious, but wide of the mark. He thinks it is the English pro- vincial word for the godwit. First, it is pretty safe to assume that such a use of the word is unknown in this country. Secondly, it is obvious from the context that a bird of any sort is out of the question. Lowell is describing that hideously lugu- brious thing, a " parlor " in a New England farm-house or tavern a room seldom used except for marriages or funerals. The traveller in New England who wishes to ask a question or buy a glass of milk at a farm- house never knocks at the front door, which is rarely opened except on the above- mentioned occasions, but immediately goes to the rear door, giving access to the kitchen. Here are a few lines from Lowell's poem : There was a parlor in the house, a room

To make you shudder with its prudish gloom

Facing this last, two samplers you might see, Each, with its urn and stiffly-weeping tree, Devoted to some memory long ago More faded than their lines of worsted woe ; Cut paper decked their frames against the flies, Though none e'er dared an entrance who were wise, And bushed asparagus in fading green Added its shiver to the franklin clean.

Now it is customary to place in a fire- place or in an open stove in a disused room, autumn leaves or dried flowers or some such thing by way of ornament. Lowell's parlor had no fireplace, but instead a " franklin,"