436
NOTES AND QUERIES. [io<> s. v. JUNE 2, im
Essays on University Subjects/ published in
1859, is the "criticism" about which MR.
A. H. T. CLARKE inquires. Speaking of
style, and citing several instances, from the
classics and ^from English writers, of the
habit of revision and recomposition, Newman
states that the historian Gibbon is a case in
point :
" You must not suppose I an) going to recommend his style for imitation, any more than his in- fidelity ; but I refer to him as the example of a writer feeling the task which lay before him, feeling that he had to bring out into words for the com- prehension of his readers a great and complicated scene, and wishing that those words should be adequate to his undertaking. I think he wrote the first chapter of his History three times over ; it was not that he corrected or improved the first copy: but he put his first essay, and then his second, aside he recast his matter, till he had hit the precise exhibition of it which he thought de- manded by his subject."
The foregoing occurs in 'Literature: a Lec- ture read in the School of Philosophy and Letters, November, 1858.' J. GRIGOR.
EARTHQUAKES IN FICTION (10 th S. v. 388). Yoltaire in 'Candide' treats of the Lisbon earthquake in several chapters.
Cowper in 'The Task' refers to earth- quakes in Jamaica and Sicily : Fires from beneath and meteors from above, Portentous, unexampled, unexplained, Have kindled beacons in the skies ; and th' old And crazy Earth has had her shaking fits More frequent, and foregone her usual rest.
Alas for Sicily ! rude fragments now
Lie scattered, where the shapely column stood.
Cowper's description of an earthquake may be compared with that by Shak- speare :
Oft the teeming earth
Is with a kind of colick pinched and vexed
By the imprisoning of unruly wind
Within her womb ; which, for enlargement striving,
Shakes the old beldame earth, and topples down
Steeples and moss-grown towers.
Perhaps Cowper had in mind another passage in Shakspeare :
Some say, the earth Was feverous and did shake.
E. YARDLEY.
ESCUTCHEON OF PRETENCE (10 th S. iv. 429, 496 ; v. 392). In reply to MR. UDAL'S com- munication, I would say that the edition of Boutell's 'Heraldry' on which I relied is the second, published by Cassell, Petter & Galpin, in 1871. I may draw his attention especially
JAMES WATSON.
- LEICESTER'S GHOST' (10 th S. v. 388). Our
Editor's note to this query is almost all that
can be said. Nothing is known of the author.
It has been wrongly attributed to the Jesuit
Parsons, and to John Leycester, a poetaster of
the time. The ' Commonwealth ' is probably
contemporary with the Earl of Leicester, and
remained in MS. till 1641.
EDWARD SMITH.
THE GUNNINGS OF CASTLE COOTE (10 th S. v.323, 374, 395). The beautiful Miss Gunnings- were cousins in two different ways to the baronets of that name. The father of the first baronet was their father's first cousin, and married Catharine Edwards, who was his niece.
John Gunning=p
Bryan=p
John
pjohn Ed- wards
John=
r Margaret=
The Catharine Robert
Beauties Edwards=pGunning
j
Sir Robert Gunning, First Bart.
CONSTANCE RUSSELL. Swallowfield, Reading.
It is right to point out that the several documents described by MR. HORACE BLEACK- LEY in his interesting communication as being in the "Dublin Record Office "are, in fact, in the Registry of Deeds Office, Hen- rietta Street, Dublin, which is nearly a mile from the Public Record Office, Four Courts, and has no more connexion with the latter than the Probate Offices in Somerset House have with the Public Record Office, Fetter Lane. A system of registration of deeds affecting lands has prevailed in Ireland from an early period in the reign of Queen Anne, and the memorials (i.e., short abstracts) of the deeds registered are often of great value to genealogists. It may also be mentioned that the will of 12 April, 1731, referred to as being in the "Dublin Probate Office," is in reality in the Public Record Office.
EDMUND T. BEWLEY.
Dublin.
LEIGHTON'S * BRITISH CRESTS' (10 th S. v. 308). In reply to CROSS- CROSSLET, I may say that the work of indexing is still in progress; no arrangement has yet been made for pub- lication. I shall be glad to have particulars of any crests not occurring in Fairbairn, Robson, the printed Visitations, or other standard authorities. H. R. LEIGHTON.
East Boldon R.S.O., Durham.
