Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/137

 9 th S. I. FEB. 12, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

129

Savoy Chapel, after the demolition of much of the old place for the bridge. Can you give me any information as to whether it is true that the prisoners of war (meaning, I suppose the Frenchmen who were in England at the time of the war with Bonaparte) were confinec in any part of the old Savoy buildings ?

BESSIE PALMER.

GENERAL WADE. In looking over some books that have just come into my possession I find a folio of 24 pp., entitled 'Albania,' a poem addressed to the Genius of Scotland Dedicated to General Wade, 1737. On the fly-leaf is written " Very rare, and probably the only copy in existence." I have lookec into several catalogues of well-known Scotch collectors without being able to trace a copy neither can I find anything concerning General Wade. Can any of your readers give me information ? A SCOT.

CHRIST'S HALF DOLE. For centuries it was a custom at Yarmouth and Lowestoft to pay a tithe on fish to the vicars of the respective parish churches both on the herring and mackerel fisheries. An attempt to revive it was made, I believe, at Yarmouth within the past ten years ; but from the opposition offered it does not appear to have been legally enforced. At Lowestoft, however, steps were taken in 1845 to obtain what was regarded as the vicar's just due ; but although successful in the test case, so much ill feeling ensued that all further attempts to collect it were abandoned. I shall be very glad to receive any particulars relative to the origin and history of this customary offering.

W. B. GERISH. Hoddesdon, Herts.

WILLIAM DUFF, Author of the ' History of Scotland,' vol. i. (all published), 1750. What is known of his parentage, and dates and places of his birth, baptism, marriage, death, and burial? Where is now the MS. of the first and only volume of his ' History of Scot- land,' and what prevented him from finishing it? What were his coat, crest, and motto? Any particulars regarding him will be most acceptable. C. MASON.

29, Emperor's Gate, S.W.

AUTHORS OF QUOTATIONS WANTED. Better to leave undone than by our deed Acquire too high a fame when he we serve 's away.

"Fortiter, fiduciter, feliciter." Has this ever been attributed to S. Bernard of Clairvaux ; and, if so, where, and by whom ? It is now, in a slightly modified form, used as a motto by two noble families. J. FOSTER PALMER.

" Si vis pacem para bellum."

CYCLOPS.

POPE AND THOMSON. (9 th S. i. 23.)

MY answer to W. B. was written on the assumption that he had not read what he is kind enough to call my " minute and pains- taking investigation, as evinced in the notes to the new Aldine edition of Thomson." If he had read it, I am at a loss to account for the fact that in his query of 23 October, 1897, he attributes to Mr. Churton Collins the doubts thrown upon the view "that Pope collaborated with Thomson in the preparation of the edition of ' The Seasons ' published in 1744, on the. evidence of the handwriting." As I pointed out in my reply, these doubts were first thrown by me, although any reader of the article in the Saturday Review, in which Mr. Churton Collins reiterated those doubts in a mangled form, might reasonably have concluded that they were raised by Mr. Churton Collins.

I must first repeat for readers of ' N. & Q.' that my own mind is in suspense upon the question at issue, with a timid inclination, which I have already acknowledged, to the opinion that Pope really did write the notes in the disputed handwriting. And I shall now discuss certain points raised by W. B.'s last communication. He is "inclined to believe that the writer of the corrected lines was simply an amanuensis working at Thom- son's dictation." As I did not, and could not, anticipate the treatment which my critical notes have received, I dealt with this point less distinctly than I might have done. Nevertheless, I say (vol.i. p. 194):

'The erasures and substitutions in this hand- writing are those of a man writing while composing. The phenomena therefore exclude the notion of a ranscript. Whether they are compatible with dic- tation while composing in blank verse I cannot say ; but my own impression would, I am sure, be the impression of every one at first sight I mean that the maker was the writer."

But of course I might have focussed the scattered evidences which this preface and my critical notes afford all pointing the same way and might have expressed myself, as I now do, positively on the subject. I lave noted on p. 193, for instance, that the suggestion made in this handwriting with ! called attention in my last communication, f it had come from the author, would have )een in his handwriting : a man does not employ an amanuensis in notes of this kind. Again, 'Autumn,' 1. 396, stood in 1738 Upbraid us not, ye wolves ! ye tygers fell !
 * he very significant " Quere " (sic), to which