Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 11.djvu/146

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NOTES AND QUERIES.

[9 th S. XI. FEB. 14, 1903.

tenebras horret, in luce ; eum, qui lucem, in enebris." But, he continues, where there is no such distinction, "seger.si vires habet, loco lucido; sinon habet obscurocontmen- dus est " (' De Medecina,' ed. Daremberg, 1859 III. xviii. p. 99). This means, I take it, that whilst possessed of his ordinary bodily and mental powers the patient is to be kept in the light, but whilst frenzied in the dark. If so a "lucid interval" would normally come 'to connote the temporary quiescence of any malady, though I do not find Celsus using the phrase. Burton, however, employs it analogously. Speaking of men afflicted with inveterate melancholy, he adds, ret they have lucida intervalla, sometimes well, and sometimes ill " (' Anatomy,' II. iii. 8).

J. DORMER.

REFERENCE WANTED (9 th S. x. 387). A good collection of passages from Latin writers of the Silver Age referring to the myth will be found in Prof. Mayor's commentary on Juvenal (Sat. xiv. 280). To Mayor's list may be added Lucan, ix. 625 and 866. Strabo quotes (iii. 1, 5) from Posidonius, who flourished about 100 A.D., a story about the sun sinking in the ocean with a hissing sound off the west coast of Spain. The idea that the sun was extinguished every night and lighted again next morning is at least as old as Heracleitus, whose belief on the sub- ject is referred to by Plato in ' The Republic, 498 A (book vi. c. 11). ALEX. LEEPER.

Trinity College, Melbourne University.

For the hissing of the sun as it sets in the ocean see Juvenal, xiv. 280, and Prof. J. E. B. Mayor's note in his edition. To the long list of references there given might be ad dec Lucan, ix. 866. EDWARD BENSLY.

The University, Adelaide, South Australia.

HOGNEL OR HOGNAYLE MONEY (4 th S. ii

275 ; 9 th S. v. 287, 459; vi. 56 ; ix. 115). So far as I remember, all the instances collectec at the above references, and in the note a the last reference, relate to the Southern counties. It is possible that the following extract from the will of Alexander Leyston proved in 1498 (Register of Archbishop Rotherham, 3646), may be of value as comin! from a county between those where kognel i used and Scotland :

" I bequeth to iiij lightes withynne the saic church, pat is to say Hagoney light, Medyns lighte and Plogh light, ichone of theme, viijfZ." ' Testa menta .Lboracenaia ' (Surtees Soc.), iv. 132.

Q. V.

CROOKED USAGE, CHELSEA (9 th S. x. 147 253, 417, 474 : xi. 34). A correspondent of th Athenceum (J. E.)iri April, 1872 (p. 506), state(

there is a lane in a certain district in North

Shropshire, near the Welsh border, called

Ossage Lane, which runs along the side of

le district, the name of which seems to be a

orruption of the Welsh word ostid, which

'ughe tells us means " that which is outward ;

shield or buckler." Is it possible that the

treet in Chelsea has a similar derivation 1

JOHN HEBB.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

'he Poetry of George Wither. Edited by Frank

Sidgwick. 2 vols. (Bullen.)

JNTIL the appearance of Mr. Sidgwick's handsome ,nd scholarly edition of his "poetry" George Yither occupied a position in literature in its way unique. He was the only poet of recognizable rank whose works were practically inaccessible. Up to he middle or close of last century he might be said Q have shared that disadvantage with Sir Philip Sidney, Andrew Marvell, Lovelace, Crashaw, Cam- pion, and many others, including, perhaps, Drayton ind Daniel, since to be included in the ponderous editions of Chalmers and Anderson, in Drayton's portentous folio, or Daniel's scarce and ill -edited .2mo. of 1718 was scarcely to live. One by one ,hese and other poets were brought within reach " i the "Library of Old Authors," the "Muses'

ibrary," or independent editions by Grosart or others. Wither remained meanwhile practically untouched, his ' Hymns and Songs of the Church ' and his 'Hallelujah' being the only works which Beached the general public. The Spenser Society, t is true, printed in an edition confined to its sub- scribers almost all Wither's poetry, good, bad, and indifferent. To the general reader these reprints are non-existent, and to many in the limited circle of subscribers, in which we include ourselves, they are detestable. Many attempts to bring Wither within reach of the esoteric were made by various admirers, and one edition, intended to include all that is valuable in his poetry, was compiled with the sanction and assistance of Charles Lamb. This utterly miscarried, most of the copies having been destroyed ; and the reprints executed at his private press by Sir Samuel Egertqn Brydges did next to nothing to meet public requirements.

In the two volumes before us we have for the first time an adequate and satisfactory edition of Wither, or what will be so when the complementary volume which is half promised sees the light. In the volumes now before us are all Wither's most inspired writings, the works on the strength of which his claim to immortality is conceded by every good judge of poetry : ' The Shepherd's Hunting, 5 ' Fidelia,' ' Epithalamia,' ' Faire- Virtue, the Mistress of Philarete,' and some minor poems published with one or other of the works named. 'Abuses Stript and Whipt' and ' Wither's Motto' will form the bulk of the third volume whenever it appears. Knowledge of Wither's writings has been due to the selections given by Percy and others, and to the critical judgments of Brydges, Lamb, Hazlitt. Willmott, and Mr. Swinburne. Some of Withers poems notably his " Shall I, wasting in despair?" "Hence away, thou siren, leave me,"