Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/591

 9*s.VLDEc.22,i9oo.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 491 ARNOLD OF RUGBY. (9th S. vi. 446.) WOULD it not be well to insert the enclosed reply from Mrs. Humphry Ward 1 THE ARNOLDS. TO THE EDITOR OF THE 'DAILY POST.' Sir,—A paragraph in the Liverpool JDaily Post has just been sent to me, in which it is stated that Matthew Arnold and his family were of Jewish extraction, and that their true name is not Arnold, but Aaron. This statement, or something like it, has been made before by others as misinformed as your correspondent. So you will perhaps allow me to set the matter at rest. Whatever Matthew Arnold might have felt towards any kinship with the great Hebrew race, so fruitful in genius and in art, nad he possessed it, one cannot say; but he did not possess it. The main stuff of his Arnold .stuck was pure East Anglian ; and his father's Suffolk forbears, small yeomen and fishing-folk from Lowestoft and its neighbourhood, can be traced back plainly to the middle of the sixteenth century. The name is, of course, of German origin, and there are several centres of it in England. But in Matthew Arnold and his kin there was also a marked Celtic element, which may perhaps account for some of the features and colouring that your correspondent misinterprets. On his mother's side he was Cornish, descended from Penroses and Trevenens; while through his father's mother he was connected with various Irish families of well- known Irish names. East Anglian, mingled with Celtic—this, whatever may be the case with other Arnolds, sums up the ancestry of Matthew Arnold and his father.—Yours, &c., MARY A. WARD. 25, Grosvenor Place, S.W. A. T. MlCHELL. NURSERY RIMES (9th S. v. 27, 93, 216).— Every one knows the nursery rime begin- ning with the words Hey, rub a dub, three maids in a tub. Halliwell has changed the " maids " to " men," but the former is the word in the old editions of 'Mother Goose.' In the 'Mythologia' of Natalis (Padua, 1616) the Three Graces are represented as standing with a serpent coiled thrice round their legs, t'.«., in three rings below the knees. Now this is eminently at first sight suggestive of the hoops of a tub, and, in fact, such a triple ring could hardly have served any other purpose. Can any of your readers inform me whether the Graces are ever represented as standing together in a shell, vase, or any equivalent for a tub ? In reference to this subject, I may mention that I have been for some time engaged on a work in which I point out the great number of English nursery or popular rimes, <tc., which seem to have been suggested by, or which agree with, mediseval grotesques, church carvings, broadside pictures, and the like, on which subject there are many suggestions in the works of Wright and Wildridge. I should be much obliged to any one who would kindly indicate to me any other books, engraved sets or series of misereres, or choir seats, or Gothic grotesques, which bear on the subject, there being little English material for it where I now live. There are, however, no Eeople in Great Britain living near any old uilaing in which are carved figures of the olden time, or who possess illuminated MSS. or books with quaint decoration, who cannot discover with a little search something corre- sponding to a nursery or common popular rime, jingle, game, or the like; for all these things were very extensively used in popular decoration, which was abundant in childlike feeling. Should any be inclined to aid me in this—"for whom for ever I will truly pray —I would mention that my address is the Hotel Victoria, 44, Lung' Arno Vespucci, Florence, Italy. CHARLES GODFREY LELAND. WINSER'S GRAVESTONE (9th S. vi. 387).— Old Winser was a noted man, he light did give to many, His life was spent in usefulness, he Press nor puffer heeded; He now rests peaceful in the dark, where there s no light for any, In hopes of seeing brighter scenes, where gas is superseded. His family stood round his bed, as he lay there and die did ; Ho passed away without a priest, he hated all their All scribb'lers and compilers too he openly derided ; Of Andrews he, expiring, said, " Poor Billy ! What an ass! Give him, my son, my dying words. Oh ! write them down in haste; Tell him to still continue well himself to advertise (To him I leave my scissors sharp, my biggest pot of paste), Or he '11 be with the fire brigade, when I an angel rise." In Kensal Green till Gabriel trumps, this good man he reposes; Turned up unto the daisy roots his mouth and eke his nose is; His children they did share his pelf, of which he had good store ; Andrews he left —to flounder in his pettifogging lore. The above epitaph may interest your readers. It is in an old book that came into my possession some thirty years ago, and from its allusion to "gas" seems to apply to the Winser mentioned by your querist. L. WARDEN, M.D.