Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 3.djvu/197

 ii s. in. MAR. 11, MI.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

191

It will be noticed that not only was the subject of tha epitaph not Lady O'Looney, but also that she was not Mrs. Maloney. She was Mrs. Molony. This latter confusion probably arose from the fact that the first wife of Edmond Molony was a Malone by marriage as well as by birth. Further each Mrs. Molony had the Christian name " Jane." Eavenshaw gives the epitaph in capital letters all of the same size excepting " Mrs. Jane Molony " (2nd line), which is in larger capitals, all equal in size. There are no stops excepting those which I give.

Regarding " whose bust is here surmounted or subjoined " I think that I am right in saying that there is now no bust at all. Possibly the bust was, or was intended to be, that of Edmond Burke, but more pro- bably, I think, " whose " refers to Mrs. Jane Molony, the subject of the epitaph. A correspondent (10 S. vii. 198) se.ys of the chapel, " The monumental inscriptions have been printed in Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica from Second Series iii. 125 to v. 379." It is to be hoped that Mrs. Molony's epitaph is one of them.

By reference to my note 10 S. vii. 135 it will be seen that Mrs. Molony's water- colour pictures cannot be traced in the Royal Academy catalogues. Perhaps they were sent to Somerset House and rejected- ROBERT PIERPOINT.

[Replies also from Gr. F. R. B. and MR. ALAN STUWART.]

MILTON ON PLAGIARISM (11 S. ii. 309). The words usually cited occur in the ' Eikono- klastes,' chap, xviii. :

" For such kind of borrowing as this, if it be not bettered by the borrower among good authors is accounted plagiary."

Iii the light of Milton's alleged obligations to the Dutch poet Vondel, whose ' Lucifer,' ' Adam in Ballingschap,' and ' Samson ' he appears to have been pretty conversant with, this pronouncement is all-important ; (see Milton and Vondel,' by G. Edmundson* London, 1885).

The subject of plagiarism, however, is treated at far greater length in the first chapter of ' Eikonoklastes,' wheie the delin- quencies of the writer of ' Eikon Basilike ' are taken up categorically ; especially in the paragraph beginning :

" For he certainly whose mind could serve him to seek a Christian prayer out of a pagan legend, and assume it for his own." The heated tone and argumentation per- vading this tract arc rather calculated to

lower the popular estimate of the author of ' Paradise Lost ' as a politician and man of letters, whc even goes the length of charging Charles I. with being an accessory of the death of his father. N. W. HILL.

OF HAND " (11 S. iii. 129). It may be that MR. POTTS is right in tracing Wordsworth's quoted line to a passage in Scott's ' Talis- man.' At all events, the two quotations provide a very interesting parallel. I would venture to suggest another solution. In Moxon's edition of Wordsworth's 'Poetical Works,' London, 1865, 6 vols., it is stated in the notes on ' St. Bees,' iv. 288, that
 * ' CRUEL OF HEART WERE THEY, BLOODY

" the form of stanza in this poem, and something in the style of versification, are adopted from the ' St. Monica,' a poem of much beauty upon a monastic subject, by Charlotte Smith: a lady to whom English verse is under greater obligations than are likely to be either acknowledged or remembered. She wrote little, and that little unambitiously, but with true feeling for rural nature, at a time when nature was not much regarded by English poets ; for in point of time her earlier writings preceded, I believe, those of Cowper and Burns."

Is it not conceivable that the line quoted by Wordsworth may be taken from Charlotte Smith's * St. Monica ' ? TOE RE A.

THE EARLIEST TELEGRAPHY (US. iii. 24). Richard Lovell Edgeworth, father of the novelist, is usually looked upon as the pioneer of modern telegraphy. ' Chambers' Encyclop.' says : " Semaphores were in- vented by Richard Lovell Edgeworth in 1767 (cf. p. 91 of his 'Memoirs,' ed. 1844)." But, after all, he would seem to have been no more than an experimentalist in the art of signalling, just as he was in so many branches of science. The ' D.N.B.' says :

" In 1765 he returned to England, and took a house at Hare Hatch, near Maidenhead .... A desire to know the result of a race at Newmarket led him to invent a plan for telegraphing. He tried the experiment at Hare Hatch. It is said to have been the first attempt at telegraphic communication."

The method employed must, however, have been very primitive. His claim as originator may be fairly disputed ; as, amongst other dabblers in the art, Amoutons had, not so very many years previously, carried out successful experiments. Unfortunately, the last-named left no drawings or detailed descriptions ; which will, however, exonerate Edgeworth from the charge of copying his plans. It was not till after Claude Chappe had made known his invention to the French Government (1792-3) that the Irish scientist endeavoured to bring liis system before the