Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 5.djvu/108

 NOTES AND QUERIES. [io* s. v. FEB. 3, im.

'been aunt to Sir Henry Pickering, o Whaddon ?

"Lucy's nephew, Mr. Charles Dryden o Draiden " was the eldest son of John, Poet Laureate, by his wife Elizabeth. "He nephew Robert Elton " probably married one of the ten sisters of John, Poet-Laureate ; anc lastly, "her nephew Erasmus Lauton" in al probability was a son of the marriage o Hose, the Poet- Laureate's second eldest sister with Lauton, D.D., of Catworth.

It is stated at 4 th S. vi. 47 that " Mar> Pickering was married at St. Mary's Church Dublin, on Aug. 10, 1773, to her cousin .german Henry Rudkin, Esq., of Wells, co Carlow (son of Henry Rudkin and Deborah fourth daughter of Franks Bernard) " As may be expected after reading 10 th S. ii. 421 iRudkin Families,' no such entry appears in St. Mary's register for 1773.
 * Sir Gilbert Pickering, Bart. : Bernard anc

JOHN A. RUPERT-JONES. Penbryn, Chesham Bois.

ROBERT GREENE'S PROSE WORKS. (See 10 th S. iv. 1, 81, 162, 224, 483.)

DYCE'S list of Greene's prose works and of the tracts ascribed to him does not con- tain an important tract already mentioned, " The Defence of Conny-catching, or A Con- futation of those two injurious Pamphlets published by R. G. against the practitioners of many Nimble - witted and mysticall 'Sciences. By Cuthbert Conny - catcher, 1592." This witty tract is included in 'Greene's works in Hazlitt's * General Index' ; and quotations from it in the * New English iDictionary ' are ascribed to Greene. Those who maintain it is by Greene, upon whom it is a venomous attack, do so upon the ground, I believe, that it was a catchpenny, and written to advertise and prolong the series. Grosart, happily, reprints it, but I quite agree with him that it is not by Greene. See his note in vol. xi. p. 40. I reject it as -Greene's even more confidently upon other ground than that there adduced: upon evidence of language and style. And since there is a distinct connexion between this tract and Greene's most famous piece, the 'Quip for an Upstart Courtier,' I believe it -is worth while to consider the question a little closely.

At the very outset a difficulty confronts us. Why tivo injurious pamphlets, when we have the three parts of * Conny-catching/ and the 'Disputation,' apparently making four of about equal length 1 I think the -writer lumps the first three in one, and it is

some confirmation of this that the author of the * Defence ' lays stress upon Greene's mention of Whittington College in his address to the reader preceding Part III. He dwells upon this in his own address "To the Reader." The Third Part, the 'Disputa- tion,' and the * Defence,' all bear the date 1592. If any of Greene's undoubted tracts on conny-catching succeeded the * Defence,' we should expect to find a mention of the latter, which I have not traced. We should still expect it in Greene's * Quip,' but, on the contrary, as I am about to show, the * Quip,' makes free use of the l Defence.' This might be taken as an argument in favour of Greene's having written the latter. On the whole, I think it was written by some con- federate or friend, jointly perhaps, with the acrimonious parts placed prominently to confer interest and reality upon the attack. When the author of the 'Defence' proves "Maister R. G." to be a conny-catcher himself, by his having sold the same play, ' Orlando Furioso,' to the Queen's Players for twenty nobles, and, when they were in the country, having sold it for as much more to the Lord Admiral's men, he brings an accusa- tion Greene would have rebutted, were it possible. No doubt every one knew it, and t was useless to attempt to do so. Still, jrreene can hardly be conceived as referring }O the incident in such terms, or in any terms.

Greene's " style " varies so widely in these
 * racts from the Euphuistical Greene that

an argument upon it carries little weight. . find, however, a number of expressions in ihe 'Defence' which are nowhere used by jrreene. There is also a deal of legal jargon nterspersed, that he does not usually show 'arniliarity with (xi. 52-8 ; and elsewhere). A.nd there are, taken in their order as they >ccur, the following terms (not technical nes due to the subject of the ' Defence ') mused by Greene, or used only later in his Quip.'

"I might at the nexte Midsommer have ivorne Doctor Storie's cappe for a favor " p. 44). That is to say, I might have been langed, equivalent to a "Tyburn tippet." Dekker and Taylor the Water-poet have ' Storie's cap " several times. On the fol- owing page there is a truly humorous sketch -f a coney-catcher's discomfiture, due to Greene's tracts, that Greene could not for he life of him have penned. Stow tells us 1 Chronicle,' 1571), " The first of June John

>tory, a Doctor of the Canon law was

rawne to Tiburn and there hanged." Was e allowed to wear his academicals for a