Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/477

 9*s. ix. JUNE 14, 1902.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

469

(all of Kent), not easily accessible in print. I have ascertained that the copy of this book at All Souls' College affords nothing addi- tional as regards these pedigrees.

G. W. WRIGLEY. 68, South borough Road, South Hackney.

ALPHABET-KEEPER. This is used as a com- pound word in the Gentleman's Magazine for January, 1731, p. 33, where the death is recorded on 11 January of William Whor- wood, Alphabet-keeper to the Foreign Post Office, and again on p. 35, where the appoint- ment of his successor, I presume, is recorded as follows : ** Mr. Allan Lavalade, appointed Alphabet-keeper at the Foreign Post Office." The word alphabet in the sense of an index is given in the 'H.E.D.,' but not the compound word alphabet-keeper. Can your readers give me the exact duties of this functionary 1

D. M. R.

[See under ' Alphabet-man,' 8 th S. xi. 207, 271, 318, 451 ; xii. 492.]

EASTGATE FAMILY. In Gillow's * Bio- graphical Dictionary of English Catholics' it is said that " John Eastgate, monk of the Cistercian Abbey of Whalley, co. Lancaster, belonged to a local family now extinct, and was probably brother to Richard Eastgate, a monk of the neighbouring Abbey of Salley " Sawley, Yorksnire. Can any one tell me what was Gillow's authority for the state- ments that the family was a Lancashire one, and that it has since become extinct? A number of men bearing the name were at that time settled in Norfolk. The name was then spelt Estgate. G. E.

ERVIN. John Ervin was admitted to West- minster School on 13 January, 1766; another Ervin, whose Christian name is omitted from the school register, was admitted on 12 Janu- ary, 1767. Can any correspondent of ' N. & Q.' help me to identify these two admissions ?

G. F. R. B.

DERVISH SECTS. A correspondent writing in 1877 (5 th S. vii. 473) alludes to a then re- cently published Blue-book on the subject of Dervish sects. Will any one kindly give a reference to it 1 W. CROOKE.

Langton House, Charlton Kings.

SIR E. COKE IN THE TOWER. I find a note dated in January, 1621/2, relating to Coke's detention in the Tower at this time. He was not released till August, 1622, but this con- temporary writer, quoting the gossip of the day, speaks of him as having " the liberty of the Tower," and "excused giving his gown because it was borrowed." What does this mean 1 LOBUC.

MICHAEL BRUCE AND BURNS.

(9 th S. vii. 466 ; viii. 70, 148, 312, 388, 527 ix. 95, 209, 309.)

THE Bruce-Logan controversy has certainly not in 'N. & Q.' been "diverging into a quest after irrelevant conclusions, but it may be well at present to confine attention to the authorship of the 'Ode to the Cuckoo.' It must be evident to the candid and unbiassed student that the adverse findings of Drs. Mackelvie and Grosart cannot longer be maintained in view of recent researches, as indicated in the various publications to which attention has lately been directed. MR. BAYNE obviously lays much stress on internal evidence, and Quotes from 'Lochleven,' 'Daphnis,' and the imitation of Ramsay's 'Yellow-haired Laddie,' in support of his contention that Michael Bruce wrote the 'Ode to the Cuckoo.' In 1810 Alexander Chalmers, in his revised edition of Dr. John- son's 'Poets' (21 vols., royal 8vo), prints the following as ' Poems attributed to Logan ' (vol. xviii. pp. 67-72): 'Damon, Menelaus, and Melibceus ' ; ' Pastoral Song ' (the imita- tion of Ramsay); 'Ode to a Fountain'; 'Danish Ode'; 'Anacreontic to a Wasp'; ' The Episode of Lerina ' (from ' Lochleven ') ; and ' Ode to Paoli.' He also admits the 'Ode to the Cuckoo ' among the works of Logan, and remarks :

" In the whole of Logan's poems are passages of true poetic spirit and sensibility. With a fancy so various and regulated it is to be regretted he did not more frequently cultivate his talents. The episode of 'Lerina,' among the pieces attributed to him, indicates powers that might have appeared to advantage in a regular poem of narration and description/'

Chalmers credits Logan with that portion of ' Lochleven ' commencing on p. 186 of Mackelvie's ' Bruce,'

Low by the lake, as yet without a name, and extending to p. 196,

Of Lomond and Lerina he would talk, which forms lines 102 to 387 of this poem, But in a foot-note (pp. 184-5) Dr. Mackelvie remarks :

"The next twenty lines [this should be 21] or lines 81 to 101, pp. 185-6 in the printed text are not in the original draught, and ought to have been claimed for Logan, since his friends have been dis- posed to claim all the alterations and improvements in the poem for him."

These twenty-one lines I now hold to be Logan's, on the ground of descriptive simi- larity with other portions of his writings. In them we find " the tenants of the wood