Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/331

 n s. i. APR. 23, i9io.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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support my view : (1) the age of the third earl, (2) the year 1569, (3) the month of May, and (4) the date of Pentecost.

But apparently the day in May, 1569, on which the marriage is assumed to have taken place (10 May) does not agree with the day on which Pentecost fell (29 May). DR. WHITEHEAD quotes a statement by Mr. Greenfield to the effect that the second Earl of Southampton, "on his marriage with Lord Montague's daughter " (italics mine), conveyed his manors, lands, &c., to his future father-in-law by indenture dated 10 May, 1569. Note the words "on his marriage." DR. WHITEHEAD appears to assume that the conveyance must have been made on the very day of the marriage, or at least on a date very near thereto. But are we justified in so construing the three words in question ? Did Mr. Greenfield base his assertion upon specific dates ob- tained from his sixteenth century sources ? I should be obliged if DR. WHITEHEAD or any one else would answer this question.

Unless DR. WHITEHEAD can by citations from original sources confirm his statement that the marriage took place ' ' early in May,' 5 I am inclined to believe that it took place late in May, for the following reason. Southampton's mother opposed the match, and he married without her consent (' D.N.B.' I.e.). This probably explains the rather unusual action of the groom, who was of legal age, in conveying his manors and estates to his father-in-law in fee. Mon- tague, in view of the opposition to the match, mujht well have required the settlement to be made, and all legal matters completed, before the arrangements for the wedding were perfected. Naturally an interval of some weeks would be .necessary, thus throw- ing the date of the marriage towards the end of the month.

It was not unusual for those of the Catholic faith to be married on Pentecost during the sixteenth century. The Mon- tamies were Catholics.

HENRY PEMBERTON, Jun. Philadelphia.

' RICHARD II.,' III. ii. 155-6 : SITTING ox THE GROUND (11 S. i. 165). This subject is illustrated by an incident in Kinglake's ' Invasion of the Crimea, 1 vol. iv. p. 45, where he says of the Czar after receiving the Alma dispatches :

"He obeyed the instinct which brings a man in his grief to sink down and lie parallel with the earth, and to seek to be hidden from all eyes. He


 * ook to his bed By the side of the low pallet

3ed that he lay on was a pitcher of barley water

It is believed that for many days he took no food."

W. H. CLAY.

TEMPEST,' IV. i. 64 :

Thy banks with pioned, and twilled brims,

Which spongy April at thy hest betrims.

The word I have italicized is often taken to mean " peonied," or covered with marsh- marigold. This identification of the peony with Caltha palustris is, apparently, due to a writer in The Edinburgh Review of October, 1872, who quotes the authority of a clergyman resident for many years in Shakespeare's county. Can it be now discovered ( 1 ) who wrote the Edinburgh article ? (2) who the clergyman was ? My botanical experience of Shake- speare's country suggests no such identifica- tion of two plants widely different, one would think, to the popular eye except in the matter of their buds, which I cannot regard as decisive. Facts are asked for, not theories. NEL MEZZO.

' MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR,' II. i. 228 : " AN-HEIRES.'-' This seems very much like an imperfect reading of *' cavaliers,' 1 with the initial c and second a obliterated. It would be quite in mine Host's vein to say, " Will you go, cavaliers ? " after having addressed Ford as " guest-cavaleire," and Shallow twice as " cavaleiro- justice."

TOM JONES.

1 2 HENRY IV.,' I. ii. Falstaff says of tradesmen like Master Dombledon who will not accept his and Bardolph's security r ' ' And if a man is through with them in honest taking-up, then they must stand upon security." The explanations of the editors are unsatisfactory, e.g., Deighton says : " through, i.q. thorough (which Pope sub- stituted), downright, not standing upon petty economies " ; whereas H. Schmidt in his ' Shakespeare-Lexicon ' suggests : " If a man does his utmost in borrowing, or rather, if a man condescends to borrow, in an honourable manner." As Schmidt's two paraphrases differ widely, the " rather n is incongruous. G. KRUEGER.

Berlin.

' CORIOLANUS,* IV. v. 110. It is Shake- speare who tells us : " We must not excuse what can be emended." Why then tolerate such a line as

Should from yond cloud speak divine things, when it can be emended without the aid of a Quintilian ? I do not hesitate to say that