Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/488

 404 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9“‘S. VI. N0v.24, 1900. the older. MR. BIARSHALL wisely expressed no opinion. Ultimately, MR. LIARSHALL had both copies collated by an expert with the only available and known print of the first edition (1742), deposited in the Bodleian Library, Ox- ford. The collater found that for the purpose of makin up the priced copy some of the sheets and leaves of the first edition had been used, from which he came to the opinion that it was the older issue of the two. I was silenced, but not convinced. In connexion with the subject it will be interesting to note that Bodley no longer stands in the unique position of possessinithe only known original print of the work. I ave a genuine duglicate, ‘ By Edmund Hoyle, Gent. I Lon on : | Printed by John Watts for the Author. | MDCCXLII.” It is complete, and in its own covers with gilt edges. J. S. MICTEAR. Bangor, Down. EGG-DANCE.-When Dr. Johnson made his only visit to the Contine_nt he saw, on the Paris Boulevards, “rope-dancing, farce,” and an “egg-dance,” 16 October, 1775. His diary consisted of very brief notes, and no descrip- tion is added. Boswell’s ‘Johnson,’ 1848, p. 260. In Laborde’s ‘View of Spain,’ English translation, 1809, v. 256, there is an account of dances in use among the Valencians :- “In the first they place on the ground a great number of eggs, at small intervals from each other; t-hey dance round the eggs in these intervals; it seems as if they must crush them every moment, but notwithstanding the celerity and variety of the steps they display, they never touch one of them.” In Hone’s ‘Year-Book,’ 961, a writer who signs himself “ W. G.” describes an egg-dance w ich he saw at the fair at Utrecht in July, 1828. It was performed by a blindfolded girl of ten :- “ Fourteen eg were arranged on the ground at about two feet ciihtance from each other ...... it must have required considerable skill and practice to avoid; as she certainly did, treading on any of the eggs. An e g-dance is introduced by Goethe into Qiwilihelgm Meister,’ but I have not this at an. Strutt’s ‘ Sports and Pastimes,’ 1801, quoted in the ‘H.E.D.,’ says that “the egg-dance was common enough about thirty years back.” A dance in which the blindfolded dancer’s object is to break as many eges as possible is mentioned in ‘ N. & Q.,’ 3”  iv. 492. About 1860 I saw men in Highland costume dancing over two crossed swords in Dry ool, now part of Hull. W. C. EXPLOITS IN SWIMMING. (See ante, pp. 21, 42, 137, 193, 284.)-I think I have read many years ago - and I believe that Eutropius, once our first Latin book, is responsible for the assertion-that Julius Caesar once swam across some river or estuary, holding his coat of mail in his 1eft_ hand, and his com- mentaries between his teeth, using his right arm for swimming. It sounds very mythical and unlike] ', yet a distant memory suggests that it has been read. If Cassius may be believed, Czesar’s swim- ming powers were feeble. We read how they both leaped into the “ troubled Tiber” upon a “ raw and gusty day ”:- The torrent roar’d, and we did buffet it With lusty sinews, throwing it aside And stemming it with hearts of controversy; But ere we could arrive the point proposed, Caesar cried, “ Help me, Cassius, or I sink !” ‘ Julius Czesar,’ Act I. sc. ii. J oHN PICKFORD, M A. N ewbourne Rectory, Woodbridge. R1-:v. JOHN FLEETWOOD.-Ii) is commonly thought that the author of the (formerly much read; ‘Life of Christ,’ which is attri- buted to t e Rev. John Fleetwood, D.D., is really unknown and that that name is an assumed one. I do not think there is any proof of this ; and if so, conjecture is at fault with regard to the true author. William Fleetwood, who was Bishop of El in Queen Anne’s reign, had only one son, whose name, according to the ‘Bio raphia Britannica] was Charles, but the ‘Dictionary of National Biography’ gives it as James. The author of the ‘ ife of Christ’ produced several pther sigorks, one of which, (called ‘ The gllfta- 1an’s ictionar ,’appeare in 1775. n t e preface to this lie tells his readers that it is ounded on studies which had extended over a period of nearly fifty years, so that he must have been born very early in the eighteenth century. It can hardly be said, owever, that his learning was very profound. Thus, %nder h‘Cou£ag;3,’ he spggks og that of 1 euop on, w io retrea wit t e ten thpusand Greelcshfrom Peli;sia% andbleed th}em sae iome to t ens”; t e act ingt at as a body the Greeks never got further back gglan '1‘l};race};anditgs exceedingly* u Iplikel y that euop on imse ever saw t ens a ain, though the decree of banishment, whici he richly deserved for fighting under the banner of his country’s enemies, w even- tiéally rescinldfdt Ig! thef artéclek ed -en urlon ee wo con oun s orn of Ca-:sarea with the centurion who had buil a_ synagogue at Capernaum. The work is “illustrated and adorned with thirty curious and emblematical Engravings, executed from the Original Drawings of the celebrated