Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 7.djvu/387

 12 s. vii. OCT. la, i92o.j NOTES AND QUERIES,

319

who had copiect them in different places. The present lines are -merely headed ' Epitaphium antiquisaimum. The form in the * Adversaria ' differs in some points from that given by your querist, the second line being

Quattuor has parteis tot loca suscipiunt. This last word is distinctly preferable to *' susci- pient." The spelling of " parteis " may have been intended originally to give au antique air to the composition. Line 4 begins " Arcns," which Earth emends in the margin to "Orcus." The author is not likely to be deterre. EDWARD BENSLY.

Much Hadham. Herts.

(12 S. vii. 291).

1. The four lines beginning

If I am right, thy grace impart are the eighth verse of Pope's ' The Universal Prayer ' which was first published (as a sixpenny pamphlet) in 1738.

2. The correct form is

I have found out a gift for my fair ;

I have found where the wood-pigeons breed. This is the beginning of the fifth stanza of Part II. (' Hope ') of Shenstone's ' Pastoral Ballad,' first published in 1755 but said to have been written in 1743. See the end of vol. iv. of Dodsley's ' Col- lection of Poems.' Shenstone was pretty ob- viously indebted to Vergil, Eclogue III., 68 sq. Parta meae Veneri sunt munera : namque notavi Ipse locum, ae'riae quo congessere palumbes.

It has been pointed out in ' N. & Q.' that Shenstone's lines are quoted in ' Tom Brown's Schooldays ' as Bowe's ; and at 12 S. iv. 182 an explanation of Hughes's error was suggested.

EDWARD BENSLY.

3. ' I hate that [sic] drum's discordant sound, by John Scott of Amwell, the Quaker poet. See Campbell's ' British Poets.' G. G. L.

[Several other correspondents also thanked for replies.]

The Household Account Book of Sarah Fell of Swarthmoor Hall. Edited by Norman Penny. (Cambridge University Press, 2 2s.)

IN 1915 the Devonshire House collection of records of the Society of Friends was enriched by a notable gift from the President of the Friends Historical Society, Mr. J. H. Midgley. This was a household account book kept by Sarah Fell, the step-daughter of George Fox, from Sept. 25, 1673, to Aug. 15, 1678. It is a vellum-covered volume, 5| ins. by 4f ins., much worn and without its clasps, and numbers 117 openings. It is not absolutely complete for, at some date in the eighteenth century, it fell into most serious peril At. p. 2 of the cover a note records that " this Booke was rescued from oblivion by y e care of a Friend of Lancaster, Bridget Whalley, who dis- covered it in the hands of a Grocer there, who was using it as Waste paper " ; and to this vandal grocer are to be imputed the loss of some half-dozen leaves and the mutilation of a few

others. Bridget Whalley passed the precious' treasure on to Susanna Ha worth, through whom- it came to the Midgley family.

Swarthmoor Hall is in the, then, lonely district^ of Furness, having as its nearest town, Lancaster, bo reach which two estuaries, passable only at Low water had to be crossed. It was a house of 13 hearths liable to the tax, to be reckoned at that time a very considerable place. The house- keeping accounts reflect these conditions showing:-' bhe provision made for a large and well-to-do household, compelled to keep its store-room ready for emergencies, and in no need of frequent replenishing. There is no indication of asceticism: not only are food and all creature comforts plenti- ful, but the " three maid sisters " are found, spending money on gay-coloured apparel, and here and there an entry indicates a pleasure- jaunt. Nevertheless the character of Swarth- moor as a Quaker household as the Quaker household of the time comes out even in its- accounts. There are entries showing the frequent absences of " Father," i.e., George Fox, the girls' step-father, and of Margaret, their mother, and, also bearing witness to imprisonment. In fact on May 4, 1676, Sarah Fell puts down the sum of 2s. as what she herself gave " litle Marjeries Nurse when I went to prison at Dalton," and again enters 2s. Qd. as given by Fox to Thomas Benson, "bayliffe of y Liberties for his civility to mee beinge A Prisoner."

The entries relating to George are largely pay- ments for others, but we hear also of his pipes and;- ! tobacco ; his white horse ; of a skin of parch- ment, 4 qts. of brandy and other matters fetched < or bought for him. His departure for Holland appears, and the sending to him there of iron ore ; and an interesting entry is that which records the bringing to him from Lancaster of Francis Howgill's ' The Dawning of the Gospel Days.'

The Swarthmoor people seem to have shown themselves enterprising and capable in com- merce ; we have the accounts of ventures in iron, coal and grain. But their chief care was agri- cultural and a study of the entries made here of payment for labour, purchase of farming stock and implements, repairs and constructions and the like, might be recommended as of considerable interest and fruitfulness although it must be borne in mind that the conditions are in some respects exceptional.

The household items as might be expected contain a great number of interesting particulars. We have not space to enter upon examples of these but the reflection brings us to a mention of Mr. Brownbill's excellent Introduction, in which those who have not time for the entertaining

Eerusal of the whole of the account book will nd all the best things noted for their benefit, and carefully referenced.

Other topics which crop up are attendance at, and obligations in regard to, the Men's and Women's Meetings ; toys, books and other things for children and medicine for the sick ; help rendered to poor neighbours (there is an entry of 4s. to a collection for a man of Bootle, " when he went with his children towards New Jersey ") ; and all the business of spinning, weaving and dyeing. The interest and variety of tjie subjects is so great that we could have wished for a subject- index, the Index provided being almost exclu- sively one of names of places and persons.