Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 3.djvu/251

 9*8. m. APRIL i,m] NOTES AND QUERIES.

245

ve should be inclined to call it, of which Mrs Browning's ' Aurora Leigh ' is the worst example vhose muse is a fast young woman with the lavisl rnament and somewhat overpowering perfume o he demi-monde, and which pushes expression tc he last gasp of sensuous exhaustion."

I should like to know whether in Britain <>r America there is now a single leader o i hought who would concur with Mr. Lowel in a judgment so unjust. I had read th< passage eight-and -twenty years since, when ] knew nothing of 'Aurora Leigh/ and no c oubt at the time believed it to be true but, if I had not learnt long since never to trust to criticism, this single instance of its utter untrustworthiness would have been sufficient to put me on my guard.

R. M. SPENCE, D.D. Manse of Arbuthnott, N.B.

PROSPERO'S ISLAND. I regret to see that Mr. Sidney Lee perpetuates, in his 'Life of Shakespeare,' the most unaccountable con- fusion of Bermuda with Prospero's island. He says (pp. 252-3) :

" The references to the gentle climate of the island on which Prospero is cast away, and to the spirits and devils that infested it, seem to render its identification with the newly discovered Bermudas unquestionable."

If Bermuda were Prospero's island how is it that Ariel was sent to

Fetch dew

From the still-vexed Bermoothes? I The merry sprite was dispatched not from, i but to Bermuda, which could not therefore, 1 by any stretch of fancy, still less of fact, have ibeen Prospero's island. There is absolutely
 * np identity between the two isles. It is a

I pity that Mr. Lee thus emphasizes and per- petuates Moore's blunder. I had already I called attention to this blunder so far back as 7 th S. i. 73, but apparently to no effect, lunter's suggestion of Lampedusa rests on a vastly more reasonable basis than the (to me) unintelligible Bermudean theory.

J. B. McGovERN. St. Stephen's Rectory, C.-on-M., Manchester.

"Hop." The A.-S. heo, which has become she " in Southern English, is curiously pre- erved in Aoo, the Lancashire and West iiding pronunciation of she. The inter- mediate form shoo is also heard in the West Riding. I SAAC TAYLOR.

ROLLING-PINS AS CHARMS. I find the fol-

owmg announcement in a catalogue of curios

ately sent to me :

''Sailor's Charm, Glass Rolling- Pin for hanging in CHup s Cabin, white, decorated in colours with

hips, motto, and inscription ' A Present from New-

astle.' 14g in. long."

"Sailor's Charm, another, dark blue glass, with flags, wreaths, &c., and inscription ' A Present from Seaham.' 14 in. long."

Years ago I saw a glass rolling-pin (or more than one) suspended in a cottage in the county of Durham, and adorned, if I do not mistake, with the legend " Think on me "; but it never struck me that such a bit of bric-a- brac was regarded in the light of a charm, however charming it may have been con- sidered by its happy possessors. A rolling- pin of the knob-ended variety is very easy to suspend, but is not suggestive of being the medium of properties occult. The cottage I am thinking of had further mural decorations in the way of glass walking-sticks in which the rod was twisted after the fashion of barley-sugar. ST. SWITHIN.

"DECOCTOR" = A BANKRUPT. In Thomas Carthew's 'King's Bench Reports,' 1728, p. 29, I find it said that on such a day " T. S. mani- feste devenit decoctor (Anglice, a Bankrupt)." The case is that of Pepys v. Low, adjudged in the first year of William III.

RICHARD H. THORNTON.

Portland, Oregon.

GEORGE SELWYN'S CURIOUS TASTE. In N. & Q.,' 5 th S. ii. 201, is a letter from General Fox, son of Charles James Fox, which con
 * ains the following passage :

"George S[elwyn] had a strange (but not uncom- non) passion for seeing dead bodies, especially those of his friends. He would go any distance to gratify -his pursuit. Lord Holland was laid up very ill at 3[olland] Hfouse] shortly before his death. George Selwyn sent to ask how he was, and whether he would like to see him. Lord Holland answered, Oh, by all means ; if I am alive to-morrow I shall >e delighted to see George, and I know that if I am dead he will be delighted to see me ! ' "

In the ' Dictionary of National Biography ' vol. li. p. 231) it is said :

"Selwyn's fondness for seeing corpses and dminals and for attending executions was the ubject of frequent comment during his lifetime, but t was warmly disputed by intimate friends like )r. Warner and JPhilip Thicknesse (Gentleman 1 '.s Magazine, 1791, i. 299; ii. 705)."

5ut Selwyn himself appears to admit some oundation for the story in a letter of his to d Carlisle of February, 1777, wherein he ays:

" The author of a new Grub Street poem, I see, Hows me a great share of feeling, at the same time hat he relates facts of me, which, if they were true,

ould, besides making one ridiculous, call very

much into question what he asserts with any reason-

ble man. I do not know if you have received this

erformance. If I thought you had not, paltry as

t is, I should send it to you. The work I mean is

ailed 'The Diaboliad.' I am only attacked upon

hat trite and very foolish opinion concerning lepene