Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 5.djvu/467

. v. MAY 19, 1906.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

383'

have vowed for ever to wear, next their bare bodies, those coats of mail they served in. Hortensio. Hard penance !

Lines 2366-9, p. 35, col. 2.

Webster was surely thinking of Montaigne.

The following verse from the *^Eneid,' v. 1. 6, is quoted by Montaigne in book iii. chap. v. p. 440, col. 2, and by Marston in 'The Fawn,' III. i. 537:

Notumque, furens quid foamina possit.

We come now to the passage in Marston that Webster is supposed to have copied. As I have abundantly proved that both drama- tists imitated the * Essays ' independently of each other, I will merely deal with the parallels in the ordinary way.

Wishing and enjoying trouble us both alike. The rigor of a mistris is yrkesome, but ease and facility (to say true) much more ; forasmuch as discontent and vexation proceed of the estimation we have of the thing desired, which sharpen love and set it afire. Whereas satiefy begets distaste : it is a dull, blunt, weary, and drouzy passion. Book ii. chap. xv. p. 315. col. 2.

In Marston thus :

Herod. Upon four great madonnas have I this afternoon grafted the forked tree !

Hercules. Is 't possible ?

Herod. Possible ! Fie on this satiety ! 'tis a dull, blunt, weary, and drowsy passion. ' The Fawn,' IV. i. 103 8.

Mars ton's phrase " grafted the forked tree " is also from Montaigne :

He would hardly have perswaded Calisthenes to refuse his faire daughter Agarista to Hippoclides, because he had seen him graft the forked tree in her upon a table. Book ii. chap. xii. p. 299, col. 2.

The parallel in Webster comes in with other matter that was manifestly filched from Montaigne, but I will not stay to point out the resemblances ; yet it is interesting to note that a correction by Dyce accords with the phrasing in the 'Essays ' :

FlamitKo. What is 't you doubt? her coyness? that's but the superficees of lust most women have : yet why should ladies blush to hear that named which they do not fear to handle? 0, they are politic : they knovy our desire is increased by the difficulty of enjoying ; ivhereas satiety is a blunt, weary and drowsy passion. 'The White Devil,' 11. 103 9, p. 6, col. 2.

The old quartos make Flamineo say " where a satiety is," &c. Dyce altered to " whereas," the word used by Montaigne.

The last words of Herod's speech are followed by this question :

Who would b3 a proper fellow to be thus greedily devoured and swallowed among ladies ? Faith, 'tis a torment my very rack !

Hercules. Right, Herod, true ; for imagine all a. man possess'd with a perpetual pleasure, like that of generation, even in the highest lusciousness, he straight sinks as unable to bear so continual, so- pure, so universal a sensuality. LI. 108-16.

Almost literally from Montaigne, as is much other matter in the same scene :

When I imagine man fraught with all the com- modities may be wished, let us suppose all his severall members were for ever possessed with a plea- sure like unto that of generation, even in the highest point that may be ; 1 finde him to sinke under the burden of his ease, and perceive him altogether unable to beare so pure, so constant, and so uni- versall a sensuality. Book ii. chap. xx. pp. 344-5.

Verily according to the lawe which nature giveth, them, it is not tit for them [women] to will and desire : their part is to beare, to obey, and to consent. Therefore hath nature bestowed a per- petuall capacity ; on us [men] aseldand uncertaine ability. They have alwayes their houre, that they may ever be ready to let us enter. Book iii. chap. v.. p. 450, col. 2.

Hercules. O, sir, Nature is a wise workman. She knows right well that if women should woo us to the act of love, we should all be utterly shamed.. How often should they take us unprovided, when, they are always ready !-' The Fawn,' IV. i. 136-40.

CHARLES CRAWFORD. (To be continued.)

THE PORTMAN FAMILY AT KEW, SURREY.

IN my reply as to the Portman family (ante, p. 150) I referred to a current error regarding its connexion with Kew, in Surrey ;. and although it was noticed by me when writing on 'The Royal Residences of Kew' in last year's volume of The Home Counties- Magazine, I would ask permission of the Editor to further the correction in the widely circulated pages of ' N". & Q.' As it concerns London history if we accept Walford's inclusion of Kew in ' Greater Lon- don' the favour may appear warranted.

In all the accounts of Kew, beginning with that of Lysons in * Environs of London ' (1792), the "old palace" now remaining is said to have been once the property of Sir Hugh Portman. It is also shown that this palace occupies the site of a mansion called the Dairy House, which formerly belonged to Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, the favourite of Queen Elizabeth. The Portman proprietorship at Kew would probably be unknown but that Lysons had found men- tion in 'The Sydney Letters ' (Collins's ed., i. 384) of "a rich gentleman," viz., Sir Hugh Portman, who in December, 1595, was knighted by Elizabeth when she came to- Kew to dine with her Lord Keeper, Sir John