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REPLIES
GRAY'S ALCAIC ODE
Circumstances enable me to give a reply, which I believe will be found correct, to the inquiry of "C.B." in p. 382. of your 24th Number, "Whether Gray's celebrated Latin Ode is actually to be found entered at the Grande Chartreuse?" The fact is, that the French Revolution—that whirlwind which swept from the earth all that came within its reach and seemed elevated enough to offer opposition—spared not the poor monks of the Chartreuse. A rabble from Grenoble and other places, attacked the monastery; burnt, plundered, or destroyed their books, papers, and property, and dispersed the inmates; while the buildings were left standing, not from motives of respect, but because they would have been troublesome and laborious to pull down, and were not sufficiently combustible to burn.
In travelling on the Continent with a friend, during the summer of 1817, we made a pilgrimage to the Grande Chartreuse, reaching it from the side of the Echelles. It was an interesting moment; for at that very time the scattered remains of the society had collected together, and were just come again to take possession of and reinhabit their old abode. And being their jour de spaciment, the whole society was before us, as they returned from their little pilgrimage up the mountain, where they had been visiting St. Bruno's chapel and spring; and it was impossible not to think with respect of the self-devotion of these men, who, after having for many years partaken (in a greater or less degree) of the habits and comforts of a civilised life, had thus voluntarily withdrawn themselves once more to their stern yet beautiful solitude (truly, as Gray calls it, a locus severus), there to practise the severities of their order, without, it may be supposed, any possessions or means, except what they were themselves enabled to throw into a common stock; for nearly the whole of their property had been seized by the government during the Revolution, and was still held by it.
Our conversation was almost wholly with two of the fathers (they use the prefix Dom), whose names I forget, and have mislaid my memorandum of them. One of these had been in England, when driven out; and was there protected by the Weld family in Dorsetshire, of whom he spoke in terms of sincere gratitude and respect. The other told us that he was a native of Chambery, and had done no more than cross the mountains to get home. On asking him for Gray's Ode, he shook his head, saying, the Revolution had robbed them of that, and every thing else; but repeated the first line of it, so that there was no mistake as to the object of my inquiry. From what occurred afterwards, it appears, however, to be questionable whether he knew more than the first line; for I was informed that later English travellers had been attempting, from a laudable desire of diffusing information, to write out the whole in the present Album of the Chartreuse, by contributing a line or stanza, as their recollection served; but that, after all, this pic-nic composition was not exactly what Gray wrote. Of course, had our friend the Dom known how to supply the deficiencies, he would have done it.
There is a translation of the Ode by James Hay Beattie, son of the professor and poet, printed amongst his poems, which is much less known than its merits deserve. And I would beg to suggest to such of your readers as may in the course of their travels visit this monastery, that books (need I say proper ones?) would be a most acceptable present to the library; also, that there is a regular Album kept, in which those who, in this age of "talent" and "intelligence," consider themselves able to write better lines than Gray's, are at liberty to do so if they please.
A very happy conjecture appeared in the European Magazine some time between 1804 and 1808, as to the conclusion of the stanzas to Mr. Beattie. The corner of the paper on which they had been written as torn off; and Mr. Mason supplies what is deficient in the following manner, the words added by him being printed in Italics:—
"Enough for me, if to some feeling breast
My lines a secret sympathy impart;
And as their pleasing influence flows confest,
A sign of soft reflection heave the heart."
This, it will be seen, is prosaic enough; but the correspondent of the E. Mag. supposes the lines to have ended differently; and that the poet, in some peculiar fit of modesty, tore off the name. His version is this:—
"Enough for me, if to some feeling breast,
My lines a secret sympathy convey;
And as their pleasing influence is imprest,
A sigh of soft reflection heave for Gray."
One word upon another poet, Byron v. Tacitus, in p. 390. of your 24th Number. There can be no doubt that the noble writer had this passage of Tacitus in his mind, when he committed the couplet in question to paper; but, in all probability, he considered it so well known as not to need acknowledgment. Others have alluded to it in the same way. The late Rev. W. Crowe, B.C.L., of New College, Oxford, and public orator of that University, in some lines recited by his son at the installation of Lord Grenville, has the following:—
"And when he bids the din of war to cease,
He calls the silent desolation—peace."
I wonder where Lord Byron stole stanzas 1, 2, 3, 4, of the second canto of The Bride of Abydos; to say nothing of some more splendid passages in the first and second cantos of Childe Harold?
W. (1.)
REPLIES TO MINOR QUERIES
Chapels.—Perhaps the following remarks will be of service to "Mr. GATTY" in the solution of his Queries touching the word Chapel (No. 21.).
Spelman (Glossary, sub voce) endeavours to convince us that capella is the same as capsella, the diminutive of capsa; thus making chapel, in the first instance, "a small repository" (sc. of relics). Richardson is also in favour of this etymon, notwithstanding its harshness and insipidity. I think the common derivation (from capella, diminutive of capa) very much preferable to any other, both on the score of philology and of history. Ducange has quoted several passages, all tending to evince that capella (explained by the Teutonic voccus) was specially applied to the famous vestment of St. Martin, comprising his cloak and hood (not merely his hat, as some writers mention). The name was then metonymically transferred to the repository in which that relic was preserved, and afterwards, by a natural expansion, became the ordinary designation of the smaller sanctuaries. This derivation is distinctly affirmed by Walafred Strabo about 842, and by a monk of St. Gall, placed by Basnage about 884. The earliest instance where the word capella is used for the vestment of St. Martin appears to be in a "Placitum" of Theodoric, King of France, who ascended the throne A.D. 672—"in oratorio nostro super capella Domini Martini … hæc dibiret conjurare." In a second "Placitum," also quoted by Ducange, of Childebert, King of France (circa 695), the word capella seems to mean a sacred building—"in oratorio suo seu capella Sancti Marthini." And in a charter of Charles the Simple, circ. 900, the term unquestionably occurs in this latter signification, disconnected from St. Martin. Other illustrations may be seen in Ducange, who has bestowed especial industry on the words capa and capella.
With respect to the legal definition of the modern chapel, I may mention that, in stat. 7 & 8 Geo. IV. c. 29. s. 10., it signifies, according to Mr. Stephens (Eccl. Statutes, p. 1357.), "a chapel where the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England are performed, and does not include the chapels of Dissenters." In stat. 7 & 8 Geo. IV. c. 30., we read, notwithstanding, of "any chapel for the religious worship of persons dissenting from the United Church of England and Ireland."
C.H.
St. Catharine's Hall, Cambridge.
Chapels (No. 20. p. 333., and No. 23. p. 371.).—The opinion of the "BARRISTER" that this term had come into use as a designation of dissenting places of worship from no "idea of either assistance or opposition to the Church of England," but only as a supposed means of security to the property, is probably correct. Yet it is likely different reasons may have had weight in different places.
However, he is mistaken in "believing that we must date the adoption of that term from about" forty years ago. I am seventy-six years old, and I can bear testimony, that from my infancy it was the term universally employed in Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Cheshire, Lancashire, and, I think probable, in the more northern counties. In common speech, it was used as the word of discrimination from the Methodist places of worship, which bore the name of Meeting-houses, or, more generally, Meetings. But within the period (forty years) assigned by your learned correspondent, I think that I have observed the habit to have extensively obtained of applying the term Chapels to the latter class of places.
I have abundant evidence of the general use of the term for dissenting buildings, back to the seventeenth century. From my early life, I remember the current opinion to have been that Chapel was the word in use north of the Trent, and Meeting-house in Nottingham and southwards.
An eminent antiquary, the Rev. Joseph Hunter, F.S.A., could cast a full light upon this subject.
J.P.S.
Homerton, April 15.
Beaver (No. 21. p. 338.).—The earliest form of this word is fiber, which is used to signify the animal, the Castor, by Varro and Pliny. The fabulous story of the self-emasculation by which the beaver eludes pursuit, is thus introduced by Silius, in illustrating the flight of Hasdrubal:—
"Fluminei veluti deprensus gurgitis undis,
Avulsâ parte inguinibus caussaque pericli,
Enatat intento prædæ fibor avius hoste."
Punica, IV. 485-8, where see Ruperti.
The scholiast on Juvenal, xii. 34., has the low Latin vebrus. (See Forcellini, Lex. in Fiber et Castor, Ducange in Bever, and Adelung in Biber.) Derivations of the word bebrus occur in all the languages of Europe, both Romanic and Teutonic; and denote the Castor. Beaver, in the sense of a hat or cap, is a secondary application, derived from the material of which the hat or cap was made.
W.
Poins and Bardolph (No. 24. p. 385.)—Mr. Collier (Life prefixed to the edit. of Shakspeare, p. 139.) was the first to notice that Bardolph, Fluellen, and Awdrey, were names of persons living at Stratford in the lifetime of the poet; and Mr. Halliwell (Life of Shakspeare, pp. 126-7) has carried the subject still further, and shown that the names of ten characters in the plays are also found in the early records of that town. Poins was, I believe, a common Welsh name.
S.
God tempers the Wind (No. 22. p. 357.)—Le Roux de Liney, Livre des Proverbes Français (Paris, 1842), tom. i. p. 11., cites the following proverbs—
"Dieu mesure le froid à la brebis tondue,
ou,
Dieu donne le froid selon la robbe,"
from Henri Estienne, Prémices, &c., p. 47., a collection of proverbs published in 1594. He also quotes from Gabriel Meurier, Trésor des Sentences, of the sixteenth century:—
"Dieu aide les mal vestus."
SIWEL.
April 5. 1850.
Sterne's Koran (No. 14. p. 216.)—An inquiry respecting this work appeared in the Gent. Mag., vol. lxvii. pt. ii. p. 565.; and at p. 755. we are told by a writer under the signature of "Normanus," that in his edition of Sterne, printed at Dublin, 1775, 5 vols. 12mo., the Koran was placed at the end, the editor honestly confessing that it was not the production of Sterne, but of Mr. Richard Griffith (son of Mrs. Griffith, the Novellettist), then a gentleman of large fortune seated at Millecent, co. Kildare, and married to a daughter of the late Ld. C.B. Burgh.
I possess a copy of an indifferent edition of Sterne's works, in point of paper and type, "Printed for J. Mozley, Gainsbrough, 1795. 8 vols. 12mo." The Koran is in the sixth vol., termed "The Posthumous Works of L. Sterne," dedicated to the Earl of Charlemont by the editor, who, in his address to the reader, professes to have received the MS. from the hands of the author some time before his untimely death.
This I hope will answer the Query of "E.L.N.:" and at the same time I wish to express my regret, that we do not possess a really good and complete edition of Sterne's Works, with a Life and literary history of them, incorporating the amusing illustrations by Dr. Ferriar.
F.R.A.
April 12. 1850.
Lollius.—In answer to "J.M.B." (No. 19. p. 303.) as to who was the Lollius spoken of by Chaucer, I send you the following. Lollius was the real or fictitious name of the author or translator of many of our Gothic prose romances. D'Israeli, in his admirable Amenities of Literature, vol. i. p. 141., says:—
"In some colophons of the prose romances the names of real persons are assigned as the writers; but the same romance is equally ascribed to different persons, and works are given as translations which in fact are originals. Amid this prevailing confusion, and these contradictory statements, we must agree with the editor of Warton, that we cannot with any confidence name the author of any of these prose romances. Ritson has aptly treated these pseudonymous translators as 'men of straw.' We may say of them all, as the antiquary Douce, in the agony of his baffled researches after one of their favourite authorities, a Will o' the Wisp named LOLLIUS, exclaimed, somewhat gravely,—'Of Lollius it will become every one to speak with diffidence.'"
Perhaps this "scrap" of information may lead to something more extensive.
EDWARD F. RIMBAULT.
Henry Ryder, Bishop of Killaloe (No. 24. p. 383).—Henry Ryder, D.D., a native of Paris, and Bishop of Killaloe, after whose paternity "W.D.R." inquires, was advanced to that see by patent dated June 5. 1693 (not 1692), and consecrated on the Sunday following in the church of Dunboyne, in the co. Meath. See Archdeacon Cotton's Fasti Ecclesiæ Hibernicæ, vol. i. p. 404., who gives an account of his family.
W.(I.)
Brown Study (No. 22. p. 352.).—Surely a corruption of brow-study, brow being derived from to old German, braun, in its compound form ang-braun, an eyebrow. (Vide Wachter, Gloss. Germ.)
HENNES
Seven Champions of Christendom.—Who was the author of The Seven Champions of Christendom?
R.F. JOHNSON.
[The Seven Champions of Christendom, which Ritson describes as "containing all the lies of Christendom in one lie," was written by the well-known Richard Johnson. Our correspondent will find many curious particulars of his various works in the Introduction which Mr. Chappell has prefixed to one of them, viz. The Crown Garland of Golden Roses, edited by him from the edition of 1612 for the Percy Society.]
"Tempora mutantur nos et mutamur in illis."—"E.V." (p. 215.) is referred to Cicero De Officiis, lib. i. cap. 10., and Ovid, Met. lib. xv. 165. et seqq.
"Vox Præterea nihil."—"C.W.G." (p. 247.) is also referred to Ovid, Met. lib. iii. 397., and Lactantius, lib. iii. Fab. v. These are the nearest approximations I know.
