Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 3.djvu/170

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 . in. MARCH a. 1917.

that you are in Some doubt of their Sales, TDut hope the Person which your last men- tions Sent for a Sample, may have taken them off which would [be] more advan- tagi[ous torn away ] the effect

.to make a timely Investment against [the 'departure] of our Shipps.

The Ps. Sannoes have not yet received, "Mr Haselwood having put it in a chest laden

on a boate which is not yet arrived, but

doubt not but it will prove good, and render you many thanks for your care in its procury,

and desire you would as freely use me if you ^have occasion for any thing these Partes

yeild. I heartily thanke you for the Ps. Longees and black plaister, which fear I shall too Soone have occasion to use.

The Letter you enclosed, from Mr Freeman

' have rather cause to give you thanks for the

opening of, you therein Sir giving me proofe

of your kind care in my concernes which I shall Study to deserve, and answer by the

'like in any thing you Shall command, wherein pray Spare not.

I give you many thanks for the news you

communicated to me. I am Sorry I have none to [? return]e you, and that I cannot

-answer both yours So f[ully ? as I could wis]h. I asfsure] you I had hardly a

.gurry's* time to write Since Mr Vincent &ca. their arrivall, which was the 2d at night, So hope you will excuse me.

[Unsigned] [Endorsed] To Mr Vickers Aprill 5th 70.

R. C. TEMPLE.

[Mr. William Foster of the India Office has drawn ray attention to an error in my note on "the Mogull" in Letter XIII. (ante, p.' 124). The indi- vidual referred to was most likely not a ruler, but merely a Mughal (Muhammadan) merchant from outside Bengal with whom March was carrying

on trade. R. C. T.]

(To be continued.)

THE ORIGIN OF 'THE WINTER'S TALE.'

THE first germ of the story appears to be
 * Slavonic. This has been traced by the Polish

dramatist and critic, Stanislaw Kozmian, in a -pamphlet (Posen, 1881) entitled ' Traces of the Historical Events on which is founded Shakespeare's " Winter's Tale." ' In the year 1370 Ziemowit III., Prince of Masowsze (Masovia), of the royal race of the Piasts, married as his second wife Ludmila, the daughter of the Duke of Miinsterberg, in

{Jhurry, gharl, is a water-instrument for, measur- ing time, and the word is used by Europeans in .India for " an hour."
 * Hardly a gurry's time=hardly a spare hour.

Bohemia. Becoming suspicious of her fidelity, on the false accusation of her own sister and that sister's son, he ordered her to be imprisoned, and tortured her domestics to obtain evidence of her guilt. None of these would implicate her, but she was put to death, having first borne a son in prison. The infant was rescued by some of her friends, and brought up first by a poor gentlewoman ; at the age of 3 years he was transferred to the care of his aunt, the Princess Margaret, or Salomea, Duchess of Pomerania. Some years after- wards she presented the boy, named Henry, to his father, who before this had become convinced of the innocence of the murdered Ludmila, and suffered terrible remorse in consequence. He determined to make what amends he could by care for her son, who was destined for holy orders, but subsequently repudiated this career, having become attached to a Lithuanian princess, Ryngalla, the sister of Witold, whom he married.

The young Henry played a not unimpor- tant part in the history of his times, since by his address he persuaded Witold, the brother of Jagellon, to break off alliance with the Teutonic Knights, then warring against Jagellon, Duke of Lithuania, who, through his marriage with Queen Jadwiga, was by this time (1392) King of Poland. Henry, it is said, was soon after poisoned by the unscrupulous knights, in revenge.

The story of his birth, it will be seen, coincides closely with that of Perdita. Greene, of course, has changed the sex of the infant ; and the rest of the story of Dorastus and Fawnia has little in common with Henry's subsequent adventures. Still, not uncon- nected with the historical circumstances in which Henry of Plock, as he is usually called, was an actor, is the manner in which the story might possibly have reached England. At about the same period at which he was ambassador to Witold, in alliance with the Teutonic Order, Henry of Lancaster, afterwards Henry IV. of England, was, during his banishment, one of the English adventurers in the service of the Order. He brought in his train, as M. Kozmian shows from a record of his house- hold expenditures by Richard Kingston, Treasurer to Henry of Lancaster, some English minstrels from Coningsborough, and three fiddlers. It is not quite impossible, therefore, that one of these may have become acquainted with the story of the unhappy Ludmila and her son, and have composed a ballad on the subject, now lost I to us, but perhaps extant in the time of