Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/25

{{rh|{{sm|11 S. VIII. {{sc|July}} 5, 1913.]}}|NOTES AND QUERIES.}|19}} certainly mistaken, too, in suggesting that the word "bore" is inapplicable because it "had not as yet enriched our vocabulary" (p. 2). It first came into vogue in Walpole's own circle, and was used by his friend Lord Carlisle.

Many points of interest Miss Greenwood passes over with a mere allusion, such as Walpole's correspondence with Chatterton and his intimacy with the Miss Berrys; but, on the other hand, she preserves several traits and customs of the period which were worth recording, such as the newly arisen fashion of great folks going out of town at the end of the week (p. 69). It is amusing to find a certain county magnate writing from his magnificent castle to warn one of his guests that if she should require a cold bath, she must send on her bathing-tub in advance, "as we have not the least convenience of that sort here" (p. 79).

The book is written in a lucid and dignified style, though we could wish that that unnecessary word " meticulous" were left to the new journa- lists, who work it to death. The value of the work is enhanced by excellent illustrations from contemporary sources. The portrait of Horace in his seventy-sixth year from a pencil drawing by G. Dance strikes us as particularly vrai- w'mbla-jle and characteristic, and the same may be said of the reproduction of Eccardt's picture of Gray.

Si on College and Library. By E. H. Pearce. (Cambridge University Press.)

THIS is not the kind of book which will command a large circle of readers or which lends itself very easily to review, but it is an extremely accurate, exhaustive, and well-printed history of the College and Library of Sion, which will be welcomed by every member and every bene- ficiary of that institution.

Thomas White, D.D., the founder of Sion College (who must not be confused with Sir Thomas White, founder of St. John's College, Oxford), was a post-Reformation pluralist. Born c. 1550 at Bristol, he died in 1624, being then Vicar of St. Dunstan-in-the-West, Canon of Windsor, Canon of Christ Church, Oxford, .111(1 Prebendary of Mora in St. Paul's Cathedral. Twice married, he had no children, and made noble use of the accumulations of his ecclesiastical preferments. In 1621 he founded the White Professorship of Moral Philosophy at Oxford, endowing it with 100?. per annum ; and under his will there was founded the College and Alrns- house of Sion, to which a charter of incorporation was granted in 1626. Curiously enough, the Library, which has since become the most im- portant and conspicuous feature of the College, is not due to the founder, but is an afterthought of John Simson, his kinsman and executor, who built it soon afterwards, and endowed it with 10J. per annum.

The book before us gives a long and com- plete history of the vicissitudes, misfortunes, Mnd benefactions incident to the growth of the ('liege, including the almshouses, the Library, the College estates, and other properties, to- other with much personal history of the presi- dents, librarians, and other officers who were responsible for the management'bf them.

The story is well and minutely told. We can- not recapitulate it here,* only calling attention

to Mrs. James's very large gift of books in 1711 (p. 266), and to the strange history and loss of the most valuable MS. possessed by the Library (pp. 293-4). Chains were abolished in 1720.

The important growth of the Library dates from the time when Parliamentary assistance began to- be given to it, having been mooted in 1707, and taking shape in the Act of 1710. An Act of 1814 required the delivery of a copy of every book published to the Library of Sion College, andr to the Librarians of four Scottish Universities, and of the King's Inns, Dublin. An Act of 1836" abolished these rights, and substituted an annual sum of money in compensation for them. The compensation to Sion College amounted only to 363 15s. 2dL, which sum was to be paid yearly, and is paid to the present day. An Act of 1875^ settled the division of the London Wall pro- perty between the Hospital and the College, at the same time separating the Hospital from the College, and setting up a new body of trustees to manage the Hospital, which was endowed with one quarter of the profits of the sale of the City property and a certain share of other properties. An Act of 1884 authorized- the purchase of a new site for Sion College for 31,625Z., their share of the sale, and the erection of their new and present home on the Thames Embankment. Sixty-two thousand books were removed from the old site, in addition to 30,000" pamphlets ; and the number of books has now reached 100,000, and is yearly increasing. The story ends here. The book is accurately and beautifully printed, and enriched with two- appendixes and a complete Index.

Proceedings of fhe Cambridge Antiquarian Society*

(Cambridge, Deighton, Bell & Co.) AMOXG the papers of varied interest published in the last issue of this Society are an illustrated monograph on the ' Churches of Gothland,' b}r Prof. A. C. Seward ; and an account of a four- teenth-century inventory of the books and other possessions of Corpus Christi College, by Dr. James. The paper of most general interest is that by Dr. W. M. Palmer, in which he gives a readable and, indeed, lively account of ' College Dons, Country Clergy, and University- Coachmen.' In discussing the records of the Cambridgeshire Probate Court he prints a number of inventories of the goods which the members of the University possessed during the Elizabethan and Stuart period, in the way of furniture, books, and wines. Some curious items, as might be expected, come to light. In the shop of one John Denys about 1570 Frobisher's ' Voyage ' could be bought for Id., and the ' Vision of Piers Plowman ' for G<J. One Thomas, University^ printer in 1583, put out a volume in folio called ' Zanchi's Miscellanies,' which no one can find any trace of. What, again, were the " iij ate- merye* " which Gylpyn, a Fellow of Trinity, had ! under his windows in 1550 (p. 186) ?

THE new serial with which The CornJiill Maga-
 * !nr for July begins entitled ' The Lost Tribes' is

the work of " George Birmingham." The situation with which it starts out, the arrival in an isolated village in West Ireland of the rich widow of an Irish American, though not precisely unheard of before, is rich in humorous possibilities, which in these first chapters are well outlined. Miss Edith Sellers's ' Shifting Scenes in Lapland,' and'