Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 10.djvu/302

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [iis.x. OCT. 10,1911

authority the treatise of Heraclides of Pontus (4th century B.C.), ^P* T7 1* a-irvov (which dealt with a case of suspended anima- tion : a girl who came alive again after having been apparently dead for several days).

In bk. viii. i. 6 (8) Diogenes gives a story from a later writer, Sosicrates, in his AiaSoxcu, ' Succession of Philosophers,' to the effect that Pythagoras, being asked by Leon, tyrant of Phlius, what he was, de- scribed himself as a <tAocro(os, and explained his attitude by comparing life to a fair (Travojyvpts), and philosophers to the spec- tators who have not come to take part in the games or to make money by traffic.

Cicero tells the same story in the ' Tuscu- lan Disputations,' V. 3, 8-9, citing Heraclides Poiiticus as his source.

EPITAPH : "I WAS WELL ; I WOULD BE

BETTER ; I AM HERE " (11 S. vi. 469 ; X. 154,

193). Croker in his note on Boswell (7 April, 1775) refers to Howell's ' Letters,' book iii. 12:

" I am afraid we have seen our best Days ; we knew not when we were well : so that the Italian Saying may be well apply'd to poor England, ' I was well, I would be better, I took physic and died.' "

Mr. Joseph Jacobs has no comment in his edition.

The passage in Addison, as Birkbeck Hill points out, is in No. 25 of The Spectator :

" This Letter puts me in mind of an Italian Epitaph written on the Monument of a Vale- tudinarian : ' Stavo ben, ma per star Meglio, sto qui ' : which it is impossible to translate."

Iii his edition of The Spectator Prof. Gregory Smith suggests that Addison took this from Dryden, ' Dedication of the jfEnei's,' Works, ed. Scott and Saintsbury, xiv. 149 :

" This comes of altering fundamental laws and constitutions like him, who, being in good health, lodged himself in a physician's house, and was over-persuaded by his landlord to take physic (of which he died), for the benefit of his doctor. ' Stavo ben : (was written on his monu- ment) ma per star meglio, sto qui.' "

EDWARD BENSLY.

PAULINE TARN : FRENCH POETESS OF FOREIGN DESCENT (11 S. ix. 488; x. 151). It may interest readers of ' N. & Q.' to know of another French poetess who made a considerable name, yet was not of French birth. Lydie Wilson was Scotch on the father's side, Flemish on the mother's. She was born at Paris in 1850, and showed

for some years as much interest in music and painting as in poetry. She spent somfr time in England in her youth, and was much influenced both by Shelley and by Burns. She became an enthusiastic adherent of " felibrisme," having married M. Louis- Xavier de Ricard, whose home was in the- Languedoc. Her poems, French as well as Provensal, were published in volume form after her death which took place in 1878 under the title ' Aux Bords du Lez.'

F. H.

" ACCIDENTS WILL OCCUR IN THE BEST- REGULATED FAMILIES" (11 S. x. 271). This, like many popular sayings of th< day, originated "with Charles Dickens. is 'from the mouth of the famous Wilkin* Micawber, sen., a character supposed to be a true portrait of Charles Dickens's father, The quotation is from chap, xxviii. of ' David Copperfield ' :

"'My dear friend Copperfield,' said Mr. Micaw- ber, 'accidents will occur in the best regulated families.' "

F. W. T. LANGE.

St. Bride Foundation Libraries.

[Other correspondents thanked for supplying references.]

'THE COMING K ,' &c. (US. x. 242).

I think that this was written by Aglen A^{ Dowty. He wrote for Figaro in the seventies^ Figaro was edited and owned by James Mortimer, and was published twice a week. Sometimes Dowty signed his contributions O. P. Q. Philander Smiff.

Messrs. Cope Brothers of Liverpool pos- sessed a portrait of Dowty. They published it in an advertisement which contained many- portraits of notable people.

THOS. WHITE.

Junior Reform Club, Liverpool.

The axithor of this jeu (Tesprit and others of the series is said to have been Aigleu Doughty. See my 'D.N.B.' list (10 S. ix. 21).

WM. JAGGARD.

Rose Bank, Stratford-on-Avon.

" PERISHER " : " CORDWAINER " (11 i x. 247). According to the ' N.E.D.,'pem/ier was at first a slang term for a destroyer, but it became a general term of contempt.

The ' N.E.D.' says that cordwainer i "sometimes used by modern trade unions to include all branches of the trade " of shoe- making. I remember seeing the term applied to a living person in some news- paper about 1845, and wondering what it