Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/323

 10 s. VIL APRIL 6, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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"A gay, free-and-easy character, with a fine bright face, blue eyes, and long dark hair, he is young, only thirty next month, and a good con- stitution."

Dickens, on hearing that Longfellow was about to visit England, wrote to him : " Have no home but mine."

Longfellow notes on September 4th, 1849 :

"Saw Mr. Ticknor ; he has nearly finished with the proofs of his ' History of Spanish Literature.' In the street met Prescott, rosy and young, with a gay blue satin waistcoat, gray trousers, and shoes.' 5 Longfellow saw Ticknor only a day or two before his death in 1859, and his last remem- brance of him was his sunny smile.

Here are a few other brief comments :

" March 16th, 1850. Hawthorne's ' Scarlet Letter' is just published a most tragic tragedy. Success to the book ! "

"Sept. 17th, 1850. G. P. R. James came, the novelist, a sturdy man, fluent and rapid, and look- ing quite capable of fifty more novels. '

"June 26th, 1851. Jenny Lind called this morn- ing with Mr. Goldschmidt. There is something very fascinating about her, a kind of soft wildness of manner, and sudden pauses in her speaking, and floating shadows over her face."

"April 2nd, 1852. Read Kingsley's ' The Saint's Tragedy,' the story of St. Elizabeth of Hungary put into dramatic form with great power. I wish I had hit upon this theme for my ' Golden Legend,' the mediaeval part of my trilogy. It is nobler and more characteristic than my obscure legend."

On the 15th of September, 1880, ' Ultima Thule ' was published. It is dedicated to the poet's lifelong frien,d George Washingon Greene, with this motto from Horace :

Precor, integra

Cum mente, nee turpem senectam Degere, nee cithara carentem.

Horace had been a favourite for many years with Longfellow, who when he was only seventeen wrote to his father :

" We are reading Horace. I admire it very much indeed, and in fact I have not met with so pleasant a study since the commencement of my college life. Moreover, it is extremely easy to read, which not a little contributes to the acquisition of a thorough knowledge of every line and every ode."

In 1872 he wrote a joking letter to Greene, reminding him that

" Horace mentions the Craigie House in Ode XXI, of the First Book. He spoke of it as the viridi* crayi, in which Diana takes delight, that is, on which the moonlight lingers." The copy of Horace used by Longfellow in college is now in the library at Bowdoin, the gift of Prof. Smyth, of Andover (' Life ' by Samuel Longfellow, vol. i. p. 49).

JOHN C. FRANCIS. (To be concluded.)

Not only is Longfellow a Yorkshire name (ante, p. 201), but the maiden name of the

poet's mother is also, I believe, found among the names of Yorkshire families. A Wads- worth, who became connected by marriage with my mother's family, has a place among my recollections as having served on the grand jury at York which returned a true bill against Jonathan Martin. In my youth I heard him relate the particulars of Martin's proceedings in the Minster, and also describe the scene of the conflagration of which the mad incendiary was the cause.

F. JARRATT.

DR. HALLEY'S PEDIGREE.

OCCASIONALLY a difficult point in genea- logy is settled by means of an obscure foot- note, or, perchance, one important word ; the desired clue may rest even in a single letter of a name. More than five years ago the writer became impressed with the significance of the fact that Dr. E. Halley persistently spelt his Christian name Ed- mond instead of Edmwnd. This was thought to imply the possible derivation of his sur- name from the French Halle or Halle a supposition which appeared to receive partial confirmation from the discovery of actual examples of the spelling Halley in Normandy. On the contrary, evidence recently obtained strongly indicates that Dr. Halley 's surname is traceable to the family of Hawley of Northamptonshire, indifferently spelt Hawley or Halley. A complete pedigree showing Dr. Halley's direct male descent may ultimately be found in the Bodleian Library, as intimated at 10 S. vi. 408 under the heading ' Dr. Arthur Charlett.' The true explanation, in this connexion, of the Christian name Edmond, appears to lie in the recorded pedigree of Mewce of Holdenby, which begins with one John Mewce of Calais, who married and had issue one son, Nicholas Mewce, of Hedgman's, Essex. The latter married Elizabeth, dau. of Edmond Morant, of London, and had issue Francis, Edmond Christopher, Alice, Lucie, Maline, and Katherin Mewce (of. ' Visitations of North- amptonshire, 1564 and 1618-19,' ed. by W. C. Metcalfe, London, 1887, p. 114).

The eldest son, FrancisMewce, of Holdenby, co. Northampton (living 1618), married Elizabeth Washington, dau. of Lawrence Washington, of Sulgrave, co. Northampton, the ceremony being performed 26 May, 1615, according to a Washington family chart inserted between pp. 394-7 of Waters's ' Genealogical Gleanings in England,' Boston, 1901. This same Lawrence Washington of