Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 12.djvu/333

 n s. xii. OCT. 23, 1915.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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printed Books ; but we have receiv'd a more full Account never yet pub lish'd, which is here inserted as a Thing more wonderful than probable, and therefore more for the Diversion than Satisfaction of the Header."

Then follows the narrative of " a valiant officer call'd Lindsey, an intimate friend of Cromwell's, the first Captain of his Regiment, and therefore commonly called Colonel Lindsey."

The story, abbreviated, is aa follows. On the 3rd of September in the morning Cromwell, accompanied by Lindsey, rode to a wood not far from the army. Having dismounted, they walked a little way into the wood. Soon Lindsey was seized with horror from some unknown cause. Cromwell said to him, inter alia, " What, troubled with Vapours ? come forwards, Man ! " Very - soon Lindsey could go no farther. Cromwell called him a " Faint-hearted Fool."

Then Cromwell, advancing some distance from him, " met with a grave elderly Man with a Roll of Parchment in his Hand, who delivered it to Cromwell, who eagerly perus'd it." Said Cromwell loudly, " This is but for seven Years ; I was to have had it for one and Twenty, and it must and shall bo so." The other told him positively, " it could not be for above seven " ; upon which Cromwell " cry'd with great Fierceness," " It should however be for fourteen Years." But the other peremptorily declared, " It could not possibly be for any longer Time ; and if he would not take it so, there were Others who would accept of it." Upon which Cromwell at last took the parchment, and " returning to Lindsey with great Joy in his Countenance, he cry'd, ' Now, Lindsey, the Battel is our own ! I long to be en- gag'd.' "

Lindsey determined to leave the army as soon as possible. He deserted his post after the first charge, and rode day and night till he came to the house of an intimate friend, one Mr. Thorowgood, " Minister of the Parish of " [name not given] in Norfolk. Cromwell " sent all Ways after him, with a Promise of a great Reward to any that should bring him alive or dead."

To Thorowgood Lindsey told his story, adding "That Cromwell would certainly dye that Day seven Years that the Battel was fought." Mr. Thorowgood ordered his son John, then about 12 years of age, to write the " Relation " in his commonplace book, taking it from Lindsey's own mouth.

Echard adds :

" This Common-Place Book, and likewise the ? am f. Story written in other Books, I am assured is still preserv'd in the Family of the Thorow-

goods. But how far Lindsey is to be beliey'd, and how far the Story is to be accounted incredible, is left to the Reader's Faith and Judgment, and not to any Determination of our own."

Perhaps the legend is referred to in the- verses headed " Upon the late Storm at the Death of the Usurper Oliver Cromwell, revers'd out of Mr. Waller's fine Piece of Flattery, by Mr. Butler" : Then take him Devil 1 Hell his Soul doth claim, In Storms as loud as his King murthering Fame.

Now, at his Exit, Trees uncut are tost Into the Air, so Faustus once was lest, &c.

' The Posthumous Works of Mr. Samuel Butler,.*

fourth edition, 1732, p. 140. I do not assert that Butler was the author.

A foot-note in the reprint (c. 1821) of Josiah Rycraft's ' Survey of England's Champions,' p. 102, says :

" Colonel Lindsey affirmed, that he saw him [Cromwell] enter into a formal contract with the devil ; and Dawbeny has drawn a ' parallel betwixt Moses, the man of God, and Oliver the Protector.' But the story of this contract is explained in Nash's History of Worcestershire f where it appears to have been a citizen of Worcester, and not the devil, that had a con- ference with Cromwell."

ROBERT PIERPOINT.

THE FABRIC OF CATHEDRALS (11 S. xii- 200, 261). Durham Cathedral affords no exception to the general rule with regard to local stone, that material having been used* throughout in the original fabric. The- Durham stone perishes to a surprising extent in outside work, while the mortar joints and the stone in contact with them, hardened by absorption of lime in solution, remain intact. Meanwhile, the insides of ashlar blocks are dissipated by the action of rain^ frost, and wind, until little is left but a wall face honeycombed by excavations nearly the size of the stones. Durham Cathedral presented this appearance before it waa- " reduced to a perfect condition," as Wyatt put it, by his paring - down process, or refaced with better stone by later architects-

The pillars of Bishop Cosin's porch at the Castle Hall have been blown away, particle by particle, until there is very little left.

J. T. F.

ETRUSCAN SURGICAL INSTRUMENTS (11 S.. xii. 260). Although MR. LAWRENCE PHILLIPS is inquiring about an earlier period, he may be interested in a few notes on the metal exhibits from the Italy of the Romans. In, visiting Italy in September, 1913, I was greatly impressed with the evidence of the advanced state of metal - working in Pompeii in, say, A.D. 74. Many of