Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 4.djvu/267

 12 S. IV. OCT., 1918.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

261

LONDON, OCTOBER, 191S.

C N T E N T S. No. 85.

NOTES : Thomas Heywood and ' The Fair Maid of the Exchange,' 261 Markshall and the Honywood Family, 263 Sir James Porter, F.R.S., 265 Richard Edwards's Correspondence, 267 "Msebus," a Ghost Word, 25?, " Lucus'a non lucendo " " Tottenham shall turn French Le Gateau: Cambrai, 269 War Slang: "Sandbag Mary Ann "War Slang " Heater-shaped " G. W. M Reynolds, 270.

QUERIES : Jean Ingelow : Col. Robert Mathews Abra- ham Moore, Translator of Pindar Rosa Corder, 270 " Kimono " War Slang " Doughboys " Adam as Family Ancestor The Pilgrims' Road in East Ken Scota in Sweden, ;Henslowe and Ben Jonson, 271 Wordsworth : Seneca Cromwellian Bibles George Cromwell e. 1619 French Revolution: "Eat cake" Hotels Bristol Teal Wade " Sylvester night" "Mantle-maker's twist' Land Tax and Charitable Institutions, 272 Mrs. Abington Blanchard Family Alliances Browne of Leicestershire : Seabrook of Essex Scott of Hartwoodmyre Free Family Freeman ol Lamb's Conduit Street " The Batch ": "The Dings" Clerical Indexes, 273 Authors of Quotations Wanted, 274.

REPLIES :-Kent Family and Headbourne Worthy, 274 Empress Eugenie and the Kirkpatricks of Closeburn, 277 Sir W. Scott in North Wales Clitheroei Parliamentary Elections, 278 Henry I. : a Gloucester Charter, 279 "Gone west," 280 Washington Family " Gadget," 281

Palestine : Roman Remains Shaw of Bowes Tyran- nicide, 282 Bellott Family, 1550-1600-L. Bayly's 'Prac- tice of Piety' Ashbourne, Derbyshire " Rua Nova," 2S3 Col. Charles Lennox St. Paul's School : Stewards of the Feasts, 284 Wright of South Elmsall, Doncaster, 285 Csstlehill Grammatical Mnemonic Jingle John Dwerryhouse, Clockmaker, 286 Parcy Reed of Trough- end Authors of Quotations Wanted, 287.

NOTES ON BOOKS : ' From the Old South-Sea House ' ' Cordwainer Ward in the City of London'' The Gate of Remembrance ' ' Bulletin of the John Ry lands Library.'

Notices to Correspondents.

THOMAS HEYWOOD AND ' THE FAIR MAID OF THE EXCHANGE.'

THOUGH ' The Fair Maid of the Exchange ' is usually attributed to Heywood, his name does not appear on the title-page of the early quarto. As early as the seventeenth century a doubt as to his responsibility for the piece was expressed by Langbaine, who remarked that its "style or oeconomy" does not " resemble the rest of his labours." The truth of this observation is undeniable.

Such lines as those with which the play opens

Even now the welcome twilight doth salute

Th' approaching night, clad in black sable weeds,

Black as my thoughts, that harbour nought but

death, Thefts, murthors, rapes and such like damned

acts

might well have been written by Kyd ; and the- text throughout displays an over- strained vigour of expression and pre- dilection for lurid phrases recalling the school of Peele, Greene, and Lodge. " Anatomize the bowels of thy absurdities," " ebon night," " Diana's milk-white veil," " Adonis' play-pheere," " love's scaldin stream," " labyrinth of love," " the careful thoughts that hammer in my brain," are much more suggestive of these pre- Shakespeareans than of Heywood. Fleay attributes the play to Lewis Machin. Sir Adolphus Ward, though he is not prepared to accept this suggestion, " cannot persuade himself that Heywood was its' author," and ' The Cambridge History of- English Literature ' accordingly excludes it trom the Heywood canon, and puts it among the

glays " ascribed to " Heywood. Prof, ohelling, like most other modern critics, is also disposed to reject it, declaring that " the attempts at poetry where poetry is out of place, which occur in the very first scene as well as elsewhere, are particularly unlike the unaffected genius " of Heywood,

I must admit that on a cursory examina- tion of the play I concluded without hesita- tion that Heywood could not have written it, and I wasted a good deal of time in an unsuccessful endeavour to find a likely candidate for its authorship among the playwrights of the close of the sixteenth century. Had I at first thoroughly ac- quainted myself with Hey wood's work, and compared its vocabulary and phrasing with his instead of those of other men, I should at once have discovered that, in spite of its departures from his normal methods, his title to it was unimpeachable. This shows the danger of judging from impressions. It is not safe to rely upon an acquaintance with the normal characteristics of a writer's style where his claim to the authorship of a doubtful work is in question. If we start with an idea of an author's powers based upon the dominant qualities of his work or of the bulk of his work now extant we are liable to go completely astray. If we insist upon the pre-eminently " pastoral " quality of Peele' s plays, we shall never find u -'-, hand in ' The Battle of Alcazar ' or