Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/167

. xii. AUG. 22, 1903.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

159

our columns. In one respect only does the latest volume differ from its predecessors. The head and tail pieces, on the antiquarian merit of which we have previously commented, are now executed by the editor. For any artistic shortcomings in their execution apology is made in the correctness of heraldic design and a minuteness of detail the anti- quary will know how to prize. The headpieces consist of the shields of the later mediaeval lords of Glamorgan, De Clare, Despencer, Beauchamp, and Neville ; and of Cardiff, Herbert of Cardiff, Wind- sor, and Crichton Stuart; the King of England (ancient); Anglo-Norman Barons in the Vale, and inferior lords or old Welsh gentry of the county ; while the tailpieces consist of old buildings and spots of interest. In addition to these things there are a fine portrait of Lord Windsor, the Mayor of Cardiff in 1895-6, and well-executed photographs of the more important buildings. It has been pre- viously said that the mercantile importance of Cardiff is of growth comparatively recent. Mr. Matthews points out that already the conversation of the great part is polyglot, and that in a walk from the Hayes bridge to the Pier Head one may, apart from all question of dialects, hear a dozen languages, and declares that all the principal European nationalities are represented among the established merchants and tradesmen of the town and port.

The early chapters deal with what is called ' The Winning of Glamorgan,' and are derived from MSS. formerly the property of the "Cymreigyddion " of Abergavenny, mostly transcribed by Edward Williams (lolo Morganwg), and now in the pos- session of Mrs. Herbert, of Llanover. By the term is meant the conquest of Glamorgan by the Nor- mans in the reign of William Rufus. Mr. Matthews s is at the pains to explain what is the value of the local Welsh chronicles embodied in these MSS. This lies, he holds, in their idyllic pic- turesqueness or the seductive art which transports us "into the Celtic dreamland, where, in a magic mist, is conjured up a vision of kindly Cambro- British kings, courteous princes, lovely heiresses, tyrannical Norman barons, holy bishops, and faith- ful clansmen moving ghostlike about the shining, fertile vale of Glamorgan." Far enough seem these things from the sober prose of municipal record; but our author shows us how closely portions of them are associated with the history he supplies. Alike commendable are the naivete, and the interest of the legends transcribed. An account of the conquest of Glamorgan by Sir Robert fitz Haymon and his twelve knights is very striking, and the pedigrees which follow are held to have authority as well as interest. Forty-seven pages are occu- pied with these documents, and the second chapter supplies further gleanings from the Record Office which are of great antiquity, and contain valuable details of mediaeval life. The extracts from the Star Chamber proceedings reveal remark- able pictures of the lawlessness prevalent during the reigns of Henry VIII., Edward, and Mary. In the miscellanies of the Exchequer we come again on the name of the Turbervilles, and a few Civil War memoranda, 1644-8, and can study how, after 1645, the Welsh, till then constant to Charles, began to fall off and declare themselves for the Parliament. Subsequently (1679) we come upon proofs of the execution of priests and the general hatred of Roman Catholics. Extracts from the Minutes of Council occupy chaps, iv.-vi., and cover the period from 1708

to 1880. Chap. yii. supplies minutes of the Cardiff Street Commissioners and the Cardiff Board of Health, 1774-1865. In these we find that the practice of "boxing the Charlies" extended from London to Cardiff. How far the excellent work, with which so much progress has been made, is to be continued we know not. Another volume is, however, promised.

Six Dramas of Calderon. Freely translated by

Edward FitzGerald. (Moring.) AMONG the beautifully printed volumes of "The King's Classics" none is more welcome than the reprint of FitzGerald's renderings of Calderon. Free as they are, these translations are models in their way, and convey a faithful idea of the representative plays selected. The original edition has long been inaccessible, and the reprint is, so far as we recall, equal to it in all respects and superior in some. Dr. H. Oelsner has edited the volume and supplied a preface and some valuable notes. We should like to know more concerning 4 El Escondido y la Tapada ' reached the English stage in the shape of Bickerstaffe's ' ; Tis Well it's no Worse.' Ronquit appears in no French bio- graphical or bibliographical work with which we are acquainted, nor is a title such as ' La Cloison ' to be found in the lists of acted French plays. The volume, which is a gem, has a good portrait of Calderon.
 * La Cloison ' of Ronquit, through which, it is said,

The Valkyries. By E. F. Benson. (Dean & Son.) THIS volume, which is at least as much myth as romance, is the first of a series of works to be founded on the themes of grand operas which the publishers have in preparation. These will corre- spond, to some extent, with the ' Tales from Shake- speare ' of the Lambs. Designs by T. Noyes Lewis present those daughters of Wotan and Erda who are, perhaps, the most picturesque beings in Scan- dinavian mythology, as well as the ill-fated and incestuous loves of Siegmund and Sieglinde. Com- panion volumes will presumably deal with the loves of Siegfried and Brunnhilde, the Niebelungs, and the Rheingold.

PROF. J. W. HALES, M.A., F.S.A., has issued in a separate form a few copies of his admirable The Fame of King Alfred, delivered as a presidential address, on 23 October, 1901, before the Hampstead Literary Society at Stanfield House. Prof. Hales succeeded as President of the Society the late Sir Walter Besant.

UNDER the strange title of Bathonian Dickensiana Mr. R. H. Fryar, of Bath, is issuing a plate pre- senting, in a composite form, the spots illustrative of the associations, personal and literary, of Dickens with Bath. Royal Crescent, *' The Saracen's Head," the Pump Room, the " Beaufort Arms," and No. 35, St. James Square, are among the places depicted.

MESSRS. ROUTLEDGE promise for speedy publica- tion ' A Dictionary of Names, Nicknames, and Surnames of Persons, Places, and Things,' by Mr. Latham. It will be on a more extensive scale than anything of the kind yet attempted, and will supply references by means of which further information can be obtained from existing authorities. It will thus form a supplement to ordinary biographical, classical, and geographical dictionaries.