Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/189

 n s. ix. MAR. 7, i9H.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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an appreciative poem published in ' The Mirrour of Mutabilitie,' 1579, and describes himself as " Kinsman."

The suggestion made by Mr. J. Payne Collier that Anthony Munday came from Worcestershire or Warwickshire with other dramatists of the period scarcely accords with the fact that his father was a London draper. Otherwise the name of Hall might suggest relationship with the Hall who married Shakespeare's daughter. John Hall, citizen and draper of London, who was buried in the church of St. Thomas Aeon in 1618, had a son Anthony who, according to Burke's 'Landed Gentry,' was born in 1583, and was " Customer of Carrickfergus, Ireland, 1619." It seems possible that William Hall, Munday's kins- man, might have been a member of this London family, whose pedigree is entered in the * Visitations of London ' for 1568 and 1634. An examination of the wills of these Halls might afford some evidence of Munday's ancestry. Mr. Seccombe, how- ever, states that Anthony Munday claimed to come from a Staffordshire family.

PERCY D. MUNDY.

JOHN WILKES AND THE ' ESSAY ON WOMAN.'

(See ante, pp. 121, 143, 162.)

A GREAT deal of rather profitless discussion has ranged over the extent to which the work was printed, and as to whether it was ever completed in manuscript. The evi- dence available enables us to answer both points. We have in Add. MS. 30,885, f. 155, in the " Case for Counsel," an ex- plicit statement which bears out Curry. Phillips, Wilkes's attorney, says: "The fragment consists only of three half -sheets " (octavo, as appears from a comparison with Curry's first narrative in Add. MS. 22,132, f. 271, where he tells us that the third or last half -sheet contained the three minor parodies, and, as presently appears, this half-sheet was from p. 119 to p. 126 ; hence the whole was of 24pp.).

"The Advertisement, Design, pp. 1-9 of the k Universal Prayer,' which reaches to 122, then the ' Dying Lover,' 123-4, and the ' Veni Creator para- phrased,' 125."
 * Essay,' then a chasm to 119, where begins the

This last would require two pages, making eight altogether for these minor parodies ; in the Dyce copy and the quarto they occupy

eight pages, with six more for their three half-titles. I infer that Wilkes's original had no half-titles for these ; perhaps he intended to have engraved plates for this purpose.

Pope's * Essay ' being 1,304 lines long, and Wilkes's parody following it verse by verse, we see that just about 110 pages would have been required for the 1,214 lines that would remain after 94 had been set up, and that the original version averaged aboiit 10 lines or so to a page, with foot- notes in addition. And if 24 pages were printed out of 126, we find Wilkes's own statement that "not quite a fourth part '" was printed approximately correct.

It is to be concluded, therefore, that there was an intention to print the whole ; and that the manuscript was complete appears from Wilkes' s letter to Dr. Brock - lesby of 19 Dec., 1763, where he quotes from the parody

Ask of the learned the way? The learned are blind. That way a Warburton could never find,

corresponding to Pope's Epistle IV., 11. 19-20, with the first verse unchanged.

That much more of the ' Essay ' existed and perhaps was printed than the Ministry ever got hold of appears clearly from Wilkes's letter to Cotes of 1 March, 1764, where, writing from Paris, he says :

"As to the ' Essay on Woman,' all Europe has sufficiently condemned the base and unworthy arts us'd to obtain the little they have got of it." Add. MS. 30,868, f. 50.

It is significant that " Curry told Mr. Hassall that the red lines are nothing in comparison to a work which was done at Great George Street " (Kidgell to Webb,. " Thursday, Parliament Street," n.d., but in another hand is endorsed "10 Nov.,. 1763"); and, again, the chaplain writes :

" N.B. If you would see what other Papers Curry can shew, send a trusty Messenger to the Swan in Knightsbridge this evening 'tween five and six. I think it a good line."

(To Webb, n.d. ; but another hand has written "14 Nov., 1763 ": Guild. MSS. 214/1. Both these are originals.)

Curry stated :

"There were several obscene prints prepared to annex to the said work, which Mr. Wilkea

delivered to me. The frontispiece represented

and was digitated as far as No. 10. [Uf. Ashbee at p. 201.1 I afterwards saw the copperplate of the frontispiece." Add. MS. 22,132, f. 273.

He described one of the other prints in a further statement about 31 Oct., 1763 (Add. MS. 22,132, f. 272).