Page:Notes and Queries - Series 2 - Volume 1.djvu/12

 NOTES AND QUERIES.

[3 d S. NO 1., JAN. 5. '56.

compiled and printed at St. Alban's in 1483; -which consists of a reprint (or nearly so) of Cax- ton's edition, with the addition of a General His- tory from Adam, prefixed as a first part, and many interpolated chapters of emperors and popes, taken out of Martinus Polonus and other writers. This is the work so often confounded with Cax- ton's edition, particularly by Pits (p. 670.), who is followed by Nicolson (p. 56.). The St. Alban's Compilation was re- issued from the press of W. de Worde in 1497, with some slight alterations, and was succeeded by the subsequent editions of 1502, 1515, 1520, 1528, as also by those of Julian Notary, 1504, 1515, and Pynson, 1510;

The colophon to the edition of 1497 reads thus : " Here endyfrh this present Cronycle of Englonde, with the Frute of Tymes, compiled in a booke and also enprynted by one somtyme scole mayster of Saynt Albons, on whoos soule God have mercy." The name of this " schoolmaster " is nowhere mentioned, but it is not a little remarkable, that in the library of the Duke of Bedford, at Woburn, is preserved a manuscript English Chronicle, com- piled and written in 1448 by Rycharde Fox of St. Alban's, which commences with the reign of Alfred (A.D. 872), and as far down as the end of the reign of Edward I. is borrowed from the oMer historians ; but from this date onwards to the siege of Rouen (6 Hen. V.), where it ends, it is "Identical with the English Brute. This manu- script has, however, some additions of value, not in the usual copies, namely, the history of the ^eighteenth and nineteenth years of the reign of Richard II. ; an account of the deposition of Ri- chard, taken from the Parliament Roll, 1 Hen. VII. ; and a curious narrative of the parliament heldTat Bury St. Edmund's, and the death of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, in 1446. Whether this Fox (who is not mentioned by the bibliographers) bore any relation to the " schoolmaster," or was himself the man, future research may perhaps discover. Having pursued the history of this Chronicle so far, I shall only mention in conclusion, first, that it must not be confounded with the English Poly- chronicon, printed by Caxton in 1482 ; and se- condly, that very abridged copies of it sometimes occur, as in MS. Harl. 63., and in a MS. at Holkham, No. 669., intitled "The Newe Cro- niclys, compendyusly idrawe of the gestys of Ilynges of Ynglond."

It may appear somewhat surprising, that among all the reprints of our old English writers, this English Prose Chronicle, once so popular, should not have been included ; not, indeed, to be taken from the modernised and incomplete edition of Caxton, but from a selection of the best manu- scripts. It would be a volume well worthy the attention of one of our wealthy bibliographical clubs. F. MADDEN.

British Museum.'

THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR.

Although the following letter, addressed to my- self, may not communicate to many of your readers any information beyond that which they already possess, still afier the papers which have lately appeared in " N. & Q.," whatever evidence con- nects Sir Walter Scott yet more closely with the works that bear his name, and confirms his claim to them, will not be uninteresting. The work re- ferred to, entitled Scottish Pasquils (Edin., 1827), may be known to few persons, unless they may possibly have been thought worthy of republica- tion. It is comprised in two volumes, and the impression was limited to sixty copies. The editor observes :

"The way in which the greater proportion of these have already been disposed of must necessarily confine the collection to the cabinets of the curious. To any other recommendation it may have, that of rarity falls to be added." Preface, p. xiii.

In November, 1828, Sir Walter Scott writes :

" I am about to print an old blackguard Scotch lam- poon, of which I will send you a copy. It has reference to the tragical event from which I took the story of the Bride of Lammermoor."

In the following month Sir Walter Scott wrote as follows :

" My dear Sir,

" I have been prevented from printing my lampoon on the Stair family, in which the story of the Bride of Lam- mermoor is hinted, by finding it, though from an inferior copy to mine, printed in the enclosed collection of Scottish libels, of which Mr. Maidment, an amateur and Banna- tynian, has published a half-private edition. I beg your acceptance of a copy, as from their tenor they will soon be introuvable, and are never like to be reprinted. You will shortly have the private history of the Bride of Lammer, and the other Wuverley Novels, in an illustrated edition, which design should have been a posthumous publication, but is now to appear inter vivos.

" I send you a project entertained here, which seems to promise much. The quantity of what may be considered as causes cciebres in Scotland is great, and affords ground for a curious chapter on the wide history of human nature. The editor is painstaking and capable, a'nd should you find any one willing to subscribe, they will get a very curious book, of which the impression will be much limited.* I have been dunning the printer daily for the dedication and list to the murder of the Schaws; the red lettering has caused some delay, f

1829-30, entitled Trials, and other Proceedings, in Matters Criminal, before the High Court of Justiciary in Scotland; selected from the Records of that Court, and from Original MSS. preserved in the General Register House, Edinburgh. By Robert Pitcairn, Writer to His Majesty's Signet, F.'S.A. It was reviewed by Scott in the Quarterly Review, vol. xliv. p. 438.
 * This work was published by the Bannatyne Club,

t Sir Walter Scott was now printing his Presentation Book to the Roxburghe Club, entitled, Proceedings in the Court Martial held upon Juhn, Master of Sinclair, Capt. Lieut, in Preston's Regiment, for the Murder of Ensign Schaw, of the same Regiment, and Captain Schaw, of the Royals, Oct. 17, 1708, with Correspondence respecting that Transaction.