Read Ebook: Notes and Queries Number 55 November 16 1850 by Various

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G.W.

October 26. 1850.

"Quum ver? praedicator indefensus, missionum ecclesiasticarum caus?, in borealibus versaretur partibus, miraculum ibi stupendum san? patravit. Conspexit enim taurum ingentem, vaccarum 'magn? comitante caterv?,' in prato quodam graminoso ferocientem, maceri? tantum bass? inter se et belluam istam horrendam interposit?. Constitit Thomas, constitit et bos, horribiliter rugiens, caud? erect?, cornibus immaniter saeviens, ore spumam, naribus vaporem, oculis fulgur emittens, maceriam transsilire, in virum sanctum irruere, corpusque ejus venerabile in a?ra jactitare, visibiliter nimis paratus. Thomas autem, eapt? occasione, oculos in monstrum obfirmat, signumque crucis magneticum in modum indesinenter ducere aggreditur, En portentum inauditum! geminis belluae luminibus illico palpebrae obducuntur, titubat taurus, cadit, ac, signo magnetico sopitus, prim? raucum stertens, mox infantiliter placidum trahens halitum, humi pronus recumbit. Nec moratus donec hostis iste cornutus somnum excuteret, viv sanctus ad hospitium se propinquum laetus inde incolumisque recepit."

RUSTICUS.

"Her brow was fair, but very pale, And looked like stainless marble; a touch methought would soil Its whiteness. On her temple, one blue vein Ran like a tendril; one through her shadowy hand Branched like the fibre of a leaf away."

J.M.B.

LL.D.

J.D.

Bath.

"It is not easy to say what the members of that Church are required to believe now; it is impossible for men to foresee what they may be called upon to admit as an article of faith next year, or in any future year: for instance, till of late it was open to a Roman Catholic to believe or not, as he might see reason, the fanciful notion of the immaculate conception of the Blessed Virgin; but the present Bishop of Rome has seen fit to make it an article of their faith; and no member of his church can henceforth question it without denying the infallibility of his spiritual sovereign, and so hazarding, as it is asserted, his own salvation."

Can any of your correspondents inform me where the papal decision on this point is to be found?

STEPHEN.

EDWARD F. RIMBAULT.

"This noble collection has lately been mutilated by tearing out such single plays as were duplicates to others in the Sloane Library. The folio editions of Shakespeare, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Jonson, have likewise been taken from it for the same reason."

This is a sad complaint against the Museum authorities of former times.

EDWARD F. RIMBAULT.

The third line seems to illustrate those early illuminations in which kings and great personages are represented as sitting cross-legged. There are numerous examples of the A.-S. period. Was it merely assumption of dignity, or was it not rather intended to ward off any evil influence which might affect the king whilst sitting, in his state? That this was a consideration of weight we learn from the passage in Bede, in which Ethelbert is described as receiving Augustine in the open air:

It was cross-legged that Lucina was sitting before the floor of Alemena when she was deceived by Galanthes. In Devonshire there is still a saying which recommends "sitting cross-legged to help persons on a journey;" and it is employed as a charm by schoolboys in order to avert punishment. Were not the cross-legged effigies, formerly considered to be those of Crusaders, so arranged with an idea of the mysterious virtue of the position?

RICHARD J. KING.

D.N.

R.S. HAWKER.

Morwenstow.

The verse of Lucan referred to is in lib. v. l.238.:

F.H.B.

In the oath taken by Eleanor Pead before being licensed by the Archbishop to be a midwife a similar clause occurs; the words, "Also, I will not use any kind of sorcery or incantations in the time of the travail of any woman." Can any of your readers inform me what charms or prayers are here referred to, and at what period midwives ceased to be licensed by the Archbishop, or if any traces of such license are still found in Roman Catholic countries?

S.P.H.T.

REPLIES.

THE BLACK ROOD OF SCOTLAND.

I am not aware of any record in which mention of this relique occurs before the time of St. Margaret. It seems very probable that the venerated crucifix which was so termed was one of the treasures which descended with the crown of the Anglo-Saxon kings. When the princess Margaret, with her brother Edgar, the lawful heir to the throne of St. Edward the Confessor, fled into Scotland, after the victory of William, she carried this cross with her amongst her other treasures. Aelred of Rievaulx gives a reason why it was so highly valued, and some description of the rood itself:

"Est autem crux illa longitudinem habens palmae de auro purissimo mirabili opere fabricats, quae in modum techae clauditur et aperitur. Cernitur in ea quaedarn Dominicae crucis portio, . Salvatoris nostri ymaginem habens de ebore densissime sculptam et aureis distinctionibus mirabiliter decoratam."

"Omnia ista inventa fuerunt in quadam cista in Dormitorio S. Crucis, et ibidem reposita praedictos Abbates et altos, sub ecrum sigillis."

we find

"A most faire roode or picture of our Saviour, in silver, called the Black Roode of Scotland, brought out of Holy Rood House, by King David Bruce ... with the picture of Our Lady on the one side of our Saviour, and St. John's on the other side, very richly wrought in silver, all three having crownes of pure beaten gold of goldsmith's work, with a device or rest to take them off or on."

"Which rood and pictures were all three very richly wrought in silver, and were all smoked blacke over, being large pictures of a yard or five quarters long, and on every one of their leads a crown of pure beaten gold," &c.

I have one more notice of this famous rood. It occurs in the list of reliques preserved in the Feretory of St. Cuthhert, under the care of the shrine-keeper, which was drawn up in 1383 by Richard de Sedbrok, and is as follows:

I fear that the fact that it was formed of silver and gold, gives little reason to hope that this historical relique escaped destruction when it came into the hands of King Henry's church robbers. Its sanctity may, indeed, have induced the monks to send it with some other reliques to a place of refuge on the Continent, until the tyranny should be overpast; but there is not any tradition at Durham, that I am aware of, to throw light on the concluding Query of your correspondent P.A.F., as to "what became of the 'Holy Cross,' or 'Black Rood,' at the dissolution of Durham Priory?"

W.S.G.

Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Nov. 2. 1850.

REPLIES TO MINOR QUERIES.

"Invenit et Teucer eadem aetate Teucrion, quam quidam 'Hemionion' vocant, spargentem juncos tenues, folia parva, asperis locis nascentem, austero sapore, nunquam florentem: neque semen gignit. Medetur lienibus ... Narrantque sues qui radicem ejus ederint sine splene inveniri.

"Singultus hemionium sedat.

G.M.

Guernsey.

C.B.W.

Edgbaston.

J.W.H.

J.K.

T.C.

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