Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 10.djvu/367

 11 S. X. Nov. 7, 1914.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

361

LONDON, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 7,

CONTENTS. No. 254.

NOTES : Sir Thomas Browne and his Books, 361 Holcroft Bibliography, 362 Wine Bottles : Magnum, Jeroboam, Rehoboam Tavern Sign: "The Kilton," 365 Scott's Poems on the Battle - field Rectors of Upham and Durley Wilkes and Lord Thurlow ' Chickseed without Cbickweed '" Spirit " in the ' N.E.D.,' 366 'Measure for Measure,' I. ii. 124 French Marriages in Lanark, 367.

OUERIES: Cloisters of Canterbury Cathedral "Boches," 367 C. Waller of Wickham Will of Mrs. Mary Kinderley, 368 Biographical Information Wanted Reference Wanted ' Madame de Se>igne and her Contemporaries,' 369 Avanzino or Avanzini " Brother Johannes " Rev. Thomas Rogers De Bruxelles and

Hospital, Oxford : " Holy Thursday," 370" Trooper " =Cock, 371.
 * d'Anvers Consumption in Ireland St. Bartholomew's

REPLIES : Mourning Letter-Paper, 371 Fielding's ' Tom < Jones ' : its Geography The Cusani Gothic Mason- Sculptors, 372 Karls of Derwentwater : Descendants- Vegetable Parchment : Regent Circus Langbaine : Whitrield : Whitehead G. W. M. Reynolds, 373 Robin- son of Appleby Statues in the British Isles: John Wesley Walter Scott: Spurious Waverleys, 374 The Irish Volunteers Wentworth of Pontefract " Cord- wainer " Parson Weems " Trooper," 375 Sherlock Holmes : his Methods and Literary Pedigree Periodicals published by Religious Houses Baker of Ashcombe, 376 " Jolly Bobbins " " Mid-Keavel " " Morall," ' Midsummer Night's Dream ' The Loseley MSS. and Louvain Poets' Birthplaces Walter Bagehot : Pronun- ciation of Name " Kultur " " The hindmost wheel of the cart," 377 Wharton Family Portraits, 378.

NOTES ON BOOKS : 'The Cambridge History of English Literature ' ' Prehistoric London ' ' The Library Jour- nal 'Reviews and Magazines.

JSofcs.

SIR THOMAS BROWNE AND HIS BOOKS.

(See ante, pp. 321, 342.)

{ ; RONDELETIUS DE PisciBUS ' a provides 'Browne with a delightful disquisition on " sawces and pickles " in an unpublished letter to his son Edward. b Rondeletius, jit seems, had lost his appetite owing to ! indisposition, and was restored by the use 'rf " pickles or liquor of anchovies."

" When I read over Apitius, de re culinaria," writes Browne, "where there is mention of many >dd pickles in many whereof was cummin seed of v very grateful tast, 1 contrived a pickle out of >ysters, anchovies, pickled cowcumbers, onyons, Rhenish wine, &c., which I caused your Mother o make and I gave it to a patient whose weake nd vomiting stomack was helped thereby. I

' Rondeletius de Piscibus Marinis, Effigies xpressje sunt,' 1554. ' Sloan MS. 1847, fol. 238. ' Gael. Apitius de Re Culinaria,' Bas., 1541.

intend when Colchester oysters are good to send you a little glasse for you to tast. It pleased me so well I called it ' Muria Regalis.' "

Browne's letters give us many intimate glimpses of his domestic life, but none, I think, more charming than this description of the doctor and his good lady in the kitchen at Norwich " contriving " a pickle.

As might be expected, the library is well stocked with classics. Homer, in Greek and Latin, is there in two editions, as are like- wise Aristotle, Strabo, Pausanias, Thucy- dides, Herodotus, Plutarch, and Athenaeus in the edition noted above ; Virgil, with the commentary of Servius ; Solinus, with the Exercitations of Salmasius ; Pliny in Greek and Latin, and many others, not. varior. Browne has a good deal to say about Aris- totle. He refers, among other things, to the somewhat surprising assertion of Rabbi Ben Joseph that Aristotle acknowledged all that was written in the law of Moses, and became at last a proselyte. The Rabbi affected to have found this interesting fact in an Egyp- tian book of Abraham Sapiens Perizol ; but Browne is content to quote it from Licetus, ' De Quaesitis Epist.' a He is not able to decide whether Aristotle does or does not affirm that the pigmies fight with cranes. " Herein," he says, " Aristotle plaies the Aristotle, that is the wary and evading assertor," b and, on the whole, he is content to leave the question open. The copy of the ' Historia Animalium,' c with the commentary by Julius Scaliger, must have been in constant use. " Mine was printed at Tholouse, 1619, in f ayre letter Greek and Latin .... somewhat a thick folio," Browne writes to his son Edward in 1679.

One is glad to note that Browne was not uninterested in the English versions of the classics. In 1682 Edward Browne was engaged on a translation of the ' Life of Themistocles ' for a new edition of Plu- tarch's ' Lives,' and his father looks over the manuscript, and plies his son with hints and suggestions. He reminds him of the copy of North's 'Plutarch,' ''of a fayre and legible print, which was that you and your brother Thomas used to read at mv howse." d

1 ' De (primo) qusesitis per epistolas a Claris viris responsa Kortunii Liceti,' Bon., 1640. See Wilkin, iii. 333.

b Wilkin, iii. 44.

c 'Aristotelis Histor. de Animalib.. (Jr. ,Lat.,cum comment. Scaligeri,' 1619. See unpublished letter, dated 22 Sept., 1679, 81. MS. 1847, fol. 39. The rest of the letter is in Wilkin, i 258.

d Plutarch's Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans,' 1657. See letter, Wilkin, i. 33