Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 4.djvu/109

 us. iv. AUG. 5, mi.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

10S

below is from a letter by Sir Uvedale Price, whose addition to the verses is certainly not of equal merit. The Baronet writes to Dr. Parr at a date given by Butler as " probably 1820-1824 " (vol. ii. p. 273) :

" In the neighbourhood of Sunning Hill, where I used to be a good deal, and very near George Ellis, there was a gentleman who wrote little erotic poems to Celia in an arbour, or to Chloe by a fountain, and these namby-pamby verses of his he printed not published in a neat volume, each poem having a page to itself with a large margin. He gave a copy to Ellis ; and Gaily Knight coming to Sunning Hill, and finding this volume on Ellis' s table, was much diverted with the style of the verses, and being tempted by the broad margin he wrote under one of the poems :

Coughing in a shady grove

Sat my Juliana ; Lozenges I gave my love, Ipecacuanha.

" The fourth line is inimitable. I thought, however, that a sequel was wanting, and, there still being room in the margin, ventured to add another stanza :

Full half a score th' unwary maid

From out my box did pick ; Then turning tenderly she said, ' My Damon, I feel sick.'

" I thought this joint production of ours had remained snug in Ellis's library ; but I find now comes the Trpfc &i6w<rov that Dr. Butler somehow got hold of them, perhaps without knowing whose they were, and amused himself with putting them into Greek and Latin hexa- meters and pentameters, in which language ipecacuanha, being neither in the Dispensary of Hippocrates nor of Galen, must be ' ignota indictaque primum,' and to suit the metre must be in regard to accent (i.e. quantity) parce detorta, though not ' Grceco fonte.' "

Dr. Butler's translations do not seem to have been preserved, though they might, I think, have found a place with some of the comic renderings in ' Sabrinse Corolla.' In these days the original would probably have the further merit of being suitable as an advertisement with an illustration of the coughing beanty, who might wear what is significantly called a " pneumonia blouse."

V. R.

CROMWELLIANA. (See 11 S. iii 341; iv. 3.)

IV. CROMWELL'S EFFIGY AND ITS MOCK FUNERAL.

THE REV. JOHN PRESTWICH' s account of the ceremonies after Cromwell's death is the fullest in existence. His descendant was even able to set out the bills of the drapers and upholsterers, and the whole account adds many details to those given in the

official newsbooks. Commencing with 19> October, 1658, the effigy, Prestwich states,, was exposed to public view at Somerset House, lying on a bier or hearse surrounded with pillars and banners, between eight silver candlesticks five feet high, in which burnt wax tapers three feet long. The effigy was vested in royal robes, with a^ sceptre in its hand. On a chair covered with cloth of gold, at its head, rested the- Imperial crown. The details are too numer- ous to quote, but are confirmed by the newsbooks. The effigy itself, Prestwich states, was " curiously made to the life " of wax, " according to the best skill of the artist employed, viz. Mr. Symons." It had " a body of wood carved by Mr. Philips (being carver to the house and surveyor)."

If we turn to the accounts of Nedham, the following extracts contain all that he- says about Cromwell's body :

" This ensuing week the Corps of his late high- ness is to be exposed at Sommerset House in greater state, with the representation of his person in effigie and other ceremonies of honor and magnificence answerable to the greatness and memory of so great a Prince." The Publick Intelligencer, 4-11 Oct., 1658.

" On Monday the 18th instant the representa- tion of the person of his late highness in effigie- will be exposed to publick view at Sommerset House upon a bed of state vested with his robe of estate, a scepter placed in one hand, a Globe in the other, and a Crown on the head, after the antient and most becoming ceremony of the- preceding Princes of this nation upon the like occasion." The Publick Intelligencer, 11-18 Oct.* 1658.

In Mcrcurius Politicus for 14-21 October he tells his readers that the " funeral day >r is " appointed to be on the ninth of Novem- ber next " ; the last and solitary allu'sion to Cromwell's body being a reference to " the fourth room where both the body and' the effigies lie." Had it been there, it should have been underneath the effigy. Clearly it was not. The Publick Intelli- gencer for 1-8 November states that the funeral was postponed ; Mercnrius Politicus for 11-18 November finally fixing it for 23 November, adding :

" The effigies remains in Sommerset House standing upon an ascent under a rich cloth of estate. .. .All other things are preparing; as, the erection of rails along the Strand down to Westminster for the better conveniency of passage, the adorning of the Abbey church and the compleating of that noble and magnificent structure which is raised in the East end of the church, where a bed of state is prepared to receive the effigies ; it being to be placed thereon to be afterwards exposed for a certain time to the- publick view."