Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 4.djvu/306

 364 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9th s. iv. Nov. 4, -w. maxim became the motto of the new ven- ture. The first number opened with an address by Dr. Maitland. This was fol- lowed by a note by John Bruce, 'On the Place of Capture of the Duke of Monmouth'; then 'Shakespeare and Deer Stealing,' by John Payne Collier: and 'Pray remember the Grotto,' by the Editor. Mr. Dirke and Mr. Albert Way also contributed, and Peter Cunningham gave some ' New Facts about Lady Arabella Stuart.' Strange to say, not- withstanding the variety and interesting character of the paper, only forty copies were sold on the day of publication. In the course of the next few weeks this forty was increased to six hundred, after which the sale gradually but steadily became larger, several of the first issues having to be re- printed. In these early numbers it is curious to note the phraseology of fifty years ago, the complimentary term for contributors being "respectable," while the title of esquire was then so limited that wo actually find Mr. Murray in his advertisements adding "Esquire" to the names of most of his authors. The third number contains some original letters addressed by Lord Nelson's brother to the Rev. A. J. Scott in reference to the arrangements for the removal of the body of the fallen hero from the Victory to Greenwich Hospital. The letters are signed " Nelson," and a postscript to one of them is as follows:— " It will be of great importance that I am in possession of his last will and codicils as soon as possible—no one can say that it does not contain, among other things, many directions relative to his funeral." The Rev. Alfred Gatty, who had kindly placed these letters at Mr. Thoms's disposal, adds:— "The codicil referred to in these letters proved to be, or at least to include, that memorable document which the Earl suppressed, when he produced the will, lest it should curtail his own share of the amount of favour which a grateful country would be anxious to heap on the re- presentatives of the departed hero. By this un- worthy conduct the fortunes of Lady Hamilton and her still surviving daughter were at once blighted." In the fourth number appears a query from Sir George Cornewall Lewis, who continued to be a constant contributor, his last paper appearing only two days before his death, which took place on the 13th of April, 1863. To enumerate all the chief contributors would be to give almost every known name in literature. Many, like Mr. Dilke, chose to remain anonymous, but among those whose names appear in the early numbers may be mentioned Mr. William Bernard Mac Cabe, the author of the 1 Catholic History of England' and the first to suggest the publication at stated intervals of those General Indexes of which Lord Brougham said that " they double the value and utility of Notes and Queries" — John Wilson Croker, Lord Shaftesbury. Lord Strangford (whose translation of Camoens earned him a place in the ' English Bards and Scotch Reviewers'), Lord Braybrooke, John Britton, James Robinson Planche, Henry Hallam, Prof, de Morgan, J. O. Halliwell, Douglas Jerrold, R. Monckton Milnes, Dr. Doran, W. Moy Thomas, E. F. Rimbault, Peter Cunningham, and Samuel Weller Singer, who told Mr. Thorns that " Notes and Queries had served to call him into a new literary existence." Mr. Thorns, indeed, stated it as his belief that but for Notes and Queries " the lovers of Shakespeare would never have seen Mr. Singer's most valuable edition of their favourite poet." The first volume of Notes and Queries was completed with the thirtieth number, May 25th, 1850, the second volume running from the 1st of June to the end of the year, after which the volumes were issued each half year, the First Series being completed on the 22nd of December, 1855. By the close of the first twelve months Mr. Thorns had the delight of knowing that the objects he had in view in starting his paper had been, to a large extent, fulfilled • lie had laid down his " literary railway," ana it had been "especially patronised by first- class passengers," his aim being, as he tells us in his introduction to the fifty-second number, " to reach the learning which lies scattered not only throughout every part of our own country, but all over the literary world, and to bring it all to bear upon the pursuits of the scholar; to enable, in short, men of letters all over the world to give a helping hand to one another." And this end had, to a certain extent, been accomplished. " Our last number," continues Mr. Thorns, " contains communications not only from all parts of the metropolis, and from almost every county in England, but also from Scotland, Ireland, Holland, and even from Demorara." A further note of congratulation is added in "Our Hundredth Number," when Mr. Thorns claims " the privilege of age to be garrulous." He states that "during the hundred weeks our paper has existed we have received from Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Holland, Belgium, and France—from the United States—from India—from Australia—from the West Indies—from almost every one of our Colonies— letters expressive of the pleasure which the writers (many of them obviously scholars ' ripe and good,'