Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/92

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. vm. AUG. 2, 1913.

find, notwithstanding the absence of any record in the Act Book, that William Alex- ander received a stipend as " Archididas- calus" from the year 1718-19 onwards. It is evident that he followed Benjamin Newton immediately upon the latter' s resignation, but a second examination of the Act Book makes it certain that he was not admitted formally until the date given above. Alex- ander thus held office from 1718 till 1742. The reference to him at 11 S. vii. 385 should also be amended.

The following are corrections and addi- tions to the history of the College School by Mr. A. F. Leach ('Viet. Hist. Gloucester- shire,' ii. 314-37). Oliver Gregory (p. 331) was admitted head master 29 June, 1674. That Whitefield was pupil under William Alexander, and not Wheeler (p. 332), has been noted already (US. vii. 385), and the correct date of his entry also given. For 1692. the year given (p. 332) as that of the election of Benjamin Newton, read 3 Aug., 1712. Newton resigned 15 Sept., 1718. The date (p. 332) of Alexander's mastership is given above. The author of the ' History of Gloucester ' cited on p. 333 was G. W. Counsel, not G. W. Arundel. The present school is north of the Chapter House, not south (p. 334). [F-JRoLAND AUSTIN.

Gloucester.

ISAAC D'ISRAELI. His first appearance in print is said in the ' D.N.B.' to be the vindication of Dr. Johnson's character, signed I. D. I., in The Gentleman's Magazine for Dec., 1786. There is, however, an earlier specimen of his composition. In the answers to correspondents in the number of The Wit's Magazine for April, 1784, it is stated that the

" Silver Medal for the best original article in Prose written by a correspondent is this month adjudged to Mr. D'lsraeli, Great St. Helen's, Bishoyjsgate Street, author of the ' Account of the Family of Nonsense.' "

This ' Account ' is printed on pp. 145-7 of the magazine, and is followed in May, 1784. pp. 177-9, by a " Farther Account of the Family of Nonsense, by Mr. D'lsraeli." W. P. COURTNEY.

" UNCONSCIOUS HUMOUR." The following extract from a lately published book deserves to be put on record in the columns of ' N. & Q.' :

"The phrase 'unconscious humour' is the one contribution I have made to the current literature of the day. I am continually seeing unconscious humour (without quotation marks) alluded to in Times articles and other like places, but I never remember to have come across it as a synonym

for dulness till I wrote ' Life and Habit.' "- 'The Note-Books of Samuel Butler,' author of ' Erewhon,' arranged and edited by Henry Testing Jones, 1912, p. 166.

Butler's ' Life and Habit ' was first pub- lished in 1877. R. L. MORETON.

SHAKESPEARE ALLUSIONS. The following have not, I think, been collected. The number of passages from ' The Drunkard's Character ' makes it appear more probable that they are reminiscences of Shake- speare :

" And in regard of others, it were as needlesse, as to lend spectacles to Lynceus, an Eye to Argus, or to wast gilding on pure Gold." B. Junius [i.e. Young], ' The Drunkard's Clm-

racter,' London, 1638, A 7.

" Putrified Lillies smell farre worse than weeds." Ibid., p. 197.

" They would speake Dagger points." Ibid., p. 399.

" So the uxorious husband, at the first idolizeth his wife, ....the cold wind must not blow uDon her." Ibid., p. 425.

" It is easie for a mans sinne to live ; when himselfe is dead." Ibid., p. 496.

" It being as true of malice, as it is of love, that it will creepe, where it cannot goe." Ibid., p. 512.

Though Wit as precious every Scene doth hold, As Shakespeare's lease [sic : ? leaf] or Johnson's

massy Gold,

Though thou with swelling Canvas sail beyond Hercules Pillars, Fletcher and Beamont [sic]. John Tomkins before Ellis's

' Dia Poemata,' 1655. A Neighbour did say, She 'd an excellent way To inrich bad Land that is spent ; So much wou'd she sweat, As she walkt with heat, To Lard the Lean Earth as she went.

' Mock Songs and Joking Poems all Novel,' London, 1675, p. 19.

And tell each Spartan to his face,

They are all degenerate and base ;

That those who us'd to fight with Half -Staff,

Are dwindl'd now into a Falstaff.

' The Scoffer Scoffed,' London, 1684, p. 8.

G. THORN-DRURY.

' THE SILVER DOMINO ; OR, SIDE WHIS- PERS, SOCIAL AND LITERARY.' These are the title and sub-title of a curious produc- tion which, to judge from the Author's Note to the second edition, dated 9 Nov., 1892, was first issued in 1891. But if this Note was written for the second edition, how comes it to be appended to the " twen- tieth edition, with Author's Note to this issue," in 1894 ? It is, however, to the authorship of this literary freak that I would here draw attention. " Who is the author of ' The Silver Domino ' ? That is the question I am asked wherever I go,"