Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/192

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. VIL MARCH 9, 1901.

Francis Osborn, in his address 'To the Reader' ('Advice to a Son,' 1673), links Donne's name with those of Buckingham and Butler in these terms :

" This breeds matter of wonder, why so many should hazard their Fame, by running and yelping after those prodigious Wits of this last Age, B [Buckingham], D [Donne], H [Hudibras, as Butler was sometimes styled]." And again (p. 68) :

"This made the Lord Chancellor Egerton the willinger to exchange incomparable Doctor D [Donne] for the less sufficient, though in this more modest, Mr. T. B." Who, may I ask, was " Mr. T. B." 1

Sir Richard Baker, in his ' Chronicle of the Kings of England,' first published in 1644, thus writes of Donne (I quote from the folio of 1684, p. 427) :

" And here I desire the Readers leave to remem- ber two of my own old acquaintance, the one was Mr. John Donne [the other was Sir Henry Wotton], who leaving Oxford, lived at the Inns of Courts, not dissolute, but very neat ; a great Visitor of Ladies, a great frequenter of Playes, a great Writer of con- ceited Verses ; until such time as King James taking notice of the pregnancy of his Wit, was a means that he betook him to the study of Divinity, and thereupon proceeding Doctor, was made Dean of Paids ; and became so rare a Preacher, that he was not only commended, but even admired by all that heard him."

In 'The Epistle Dedicatory' to 'A Dis- course upon Monsieur Pascall's Thoughts,' 1688, by Joseph Walker, the translator, we have this allusion to Donne :

"I desire as Dr. Donn did, to swim like a Fish, quietly to my Long Home."

I shall be glad to know in what part of Donne's works Walker found his simile.

In a little volume of 'Essays on Several Subjects, written by Sir Tho. Pope Blount,' 1692, the writer refers to Donne in these words (p. 61) :

"But on the other hand, if Learning happens to be in the possession of a Fool, 'tis then but a Bawble, and like Dr. Donne's Sun-Dial in the Grave, a trifle, and of no use."

The reference is to a passage in Donne's poem 'The Will':-

Therefore I'll give no more, but I '11 undo The world by dying ; because love dies too. Then all your beauties will be no more worth Than gold in mines, where none doth draw it forth ; And all your graces no more use shall have, Than a sun-dial in a grave.

The last two lines are cited by Dr. Ferriar in his 'Illustrations of Sterne.' The citation suggests Sterne's appropriation of the idea in a passage from ' Tristram Shandy ':

"I verily believe I had put by my father, and left him drawing a sun-dial, for no better purpose than to be buried under ground."

In 'The Letters of the Reverend Father Paul,' 1693, the translator, " Edward Brown, Rector of Sundridge in Kent," refers to Donne, in his ' Preface to the Reader,' as follows :

"A very excellent Person [Dr. Donne], and a very good Friend of Father Paul's was once of the Mind, that a Man could not well be called a Reader, till he had read a Book over." Further on, in the same preface, Brown again refers to Donne.

In a collection of 'Letters of S r Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam,' &c., 1702, the editor, one "R. S.," of the Middle Temple, refers to Donne in a foot-note to one of the letters, thus :

" I could not in good Manners pass over in Silence my Lady of Bedford ; so much celebrated for both [wit and beauty] by that rare Wit of his Time Doctor Donne."

A. S.

" VERDURE." It would be interesting, and it would be of literary importance, if it could be shown that the plural form "verdures" has standard authority in the sense of "pastures." An apparent example occurs in the ballad ' John Hay's Bonnie Lassie ' as given in Allan Ramsay's (reprinted) 'Tea- Table Miscellany,' i. 68. According to this version, the opening couplet of the fourth stanza reads thus :

But if she appear where verdures invite her, The fountains run clear, and flowers smell the sweeter.

This reading is also given in Johnson's 'Scots Musical Museum,' probably in deference to Ramsay. Robert Chambers, apparently re- jecting " verdures," reads " where verdure invite her," both in his ' Scottish Songs prior to Burns ' and his ' Scottish Songs Collected and Illustrated,' 2 vols., 1829. Other editors follow Chambers, but the text thus given is unsatisfactory. If it were possible to say that "invite" is in the subjunctive mood, the reading would be indisputable, but the diffi- culty begins when this possibility is seriously examined. If, on the other hand, the clause is in the indicative mood, as Herd assumes in his ' Scots Songs,' " invites " is prohibited by the necessities of the rime. If only Ramsay's " verdures " were passable, the crux would finally disappear from a fine, but not specially Scottish pastoral ballad. THOMAS BAYNE.

W T ATER- VOLE. This is the name of a rodent of the genus Arvicola, better known as the water-rat, though it is not really one of the Muridse. What is the derivation of the second part of the word ? The ' Encyclopaedic Dic- tionary ' says that the etymology is doubtful, but suggests a connexion with wold. The