Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 3.djvu/195

10th S. III. 25, 1905.] heart of Scottish antiquaries, they end with the charter to Brinkeburn, 1153, edited for the Surtees Society by Mr. Page, and attributed by him, presumably in error, to Malcolm, not William, de Gwarrenne. With one exception, the 'Notitiæ of Grants to the Church of Deer' are translated from the Gaelic, are Irish, and were written, according to Mr. Skene, in the early part of the reign of David I. The charters generally are in Latin, and are of varied interest. One of them is granted to the church of St. Serf by Macbeth and Gruoch, the King and Quen of Scots. Another is a letter of Alcuin to the monks of Candida Casa, in Wigtonshire, desiring their prayers, first printed in its entirety in Haddan and Stubbs; one from Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, to King Alexander I.; three letters from Pope Callixtus II., casting a lighten Scottish ecclesiastical history, &c. So well known to antiquaries and historians are these precious documents that it is needless to dwell upon them. They are now presented in a collected and comprehensive form, and are easily accessible to the student, who has had previously to hunt them out in works not always within reach. It is in the notes and illustrations, which form the larger portion of the volume, that the most important contribution to scholarship is made. With the patient fidelity of a herald Sir Archibald has followed down the track of these grants, showing which of them are avowedly spurious, hinting at or proving the uncertainty of others, and supplying all obtainable information concerning the personages and institutions mentioned. In his opening note he describes the discovery of 'The Book of Deer,' published in its entirety in 1869 by the Spalding Club, and points out the sanguine hopes of illumination derived from its appearance. Its value and its interest in regard to Columcilla, otherwise St. Columba, and St. Drostan are conceded. Doubt is cast, however, as to whether, as Mr. Skene supposed, there was a Mormaer over each province of Northern Scotland. The general value of the 'Notitiæ' is said to have been exaggerated, and there is some question whether a monastery continued to exist at Deer from the time of St. Columba to the reign of David I. In addition to the mention of Lady Macbeth, we come on occasional references to legend or romance. To the appropriation of the lands of the Cistercian Abbey of Deer were to be attributed by Keith Marischal the sorrows of his line, celebrated by Sydney Dobell and Rossetti. On p. 273 we come upon the Boy of Egremont and "What is good for a bootless bene?" though Sir Archibald thinks it probable that he was a brother, and not a son, of Alice de Romelie. Curious antiquarian references abound, such as the practice of laying on the altar a knife as a symbol of gift. We could derive from successive notes endless matter of interest. The book is a boon to scholarship such as Messrs. MacLehose have taught us to expect from their University Press.

third volume of the admirable series of "Cambridge English Classics" differs from its two predecessors in being in verse, as well as in some editorial respects. It is printed from the edition of 1678, the first of all the three parts, the text of which it adopts, while in an appendix are supplied the variants between the accepted text and that of the early editions of 1662 and 1664. The variants in question are not seldom significant. In the first edition of the first part the opening line of canto i. reads

—a reading which we have always preferred—instead of

Considerable change has been made in the famous lines about Montaigne playing with his cat, and alterations of importance are of frequent occurrence. It may not arbitrarily be decided which text is preferable. The later has at least the advantage of being the more ample, supplying many passages not to be found in the earlier. Among the lines which do not appear in the first edition, and are now given, is the famous distich.

perhaps the best known and the most frequently-quoted in the book. We ourselves first heard this publicly quoted sixty years ago by a Quaker orator, who, however, for "damning" substituted the more innocent word "blaming." Butler's rimes are the most ingenious and flexible on record. They are not always such as would pass muster in the present century. Even the surprise rime in the second part of the second canto,

ingenious as it is, is not quite satisfactory. In this, as in previous volumes, eccentricities of punctuation are left unaltered, Mr. Waller justly holding that the pointing' of those days is no more a stumbling-block than the spelling," and asserting that it "gives to the general reader an added sense of nearness to the actual form in which the author made his appearance." We shall be glad of a companion volume with Butler's other poems.

second selection of popular ballads issued by Mr. Sidgwick is in no way inferior to the first, and the augmenting series will prove an inestimable boon to those who do not possess the large and authoritative work edited by Mr. Chappell and Mr. Ebsworth for the Ballad Society, or the admirable collection of Prof. Francis James Child. We have already spoken in high praise of the first series, the name of Mr. Bullen on the title-page and his share in the publication furnishing a guarantee for purity and authenticity of text. These things are more important than might be supposed, since modern squeamishness is threatening to deluge our shelves with works from which the scholar cannot confidently quote. There seems a danger, indeed, that, in spite of Macaulay's protest, duly quoted amidst the preliminary matter, "Rifacimenti, harmonies, abridgments, expurgated editions," may become our ordinary fare. Works such as this are, accordingly, to be prized and cherished. Something over fifty ballads are included in the present volume. They are described as 'Ballads of Mystery and Miracle and Fyttes of Mirth.' The selection is admirably made and edited. It begins with 'Thomas Rymer,' from the lost Tytler Brown MS. Following this come 'Cospatrick,' 'Clerk Colven,' 'Tarn