Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 12.djvu/511

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us. xn. DEC. 25, i9i5.i NOTES AND QUERIES.


503


AUTHORS or QUOTATIONS WANTED. Can any reader of * N. & Q.' tell me who are the poets obviously very real poets who wrote the following ? It is more than twenty years since I read the verses, and they are still vividly in my mind. I cannot trace the authors.

1. Lamia, the woman serpent, wins her thralls ;

Still Una's lion at her side is lying ; Still Merlin at the spell of Vivian falls ;

Still in his chariot is Achilles flying, And Helen still is watching on the walls.

It must be the finish of a sonnet, I think.

2. Pass round the tankard, boys, while the tap

flows for ye ;

Mad merry hearts, let the foaming jest fly ! Out in life's burning sun Man, with a man's work done. Would not have missed the fun,

Neither would I. How ! is the revel done ? Bedtime already,

nurse ?

Ay, smile, now comes the sweet lullaby ! Cool the fresh pillow lies ; He that shuts weary eyes Would not sleep otherwise,

Neither would I.

I do not remember the verses accurately, for I never attempted to get them by heart. They are quoted, probably, correctly enough to enable a wiser and more learned than myself to give me the information I want.

3. O days gone by, O living lyre

That sounds all depths of joy and pain, How, struck by Memory's hand of fire,

Ye break like light upon the brain, Like visions of another land

Wherein we are, and yet where we Never, till Tune with backward hand

His course unwind, again shall be.

I cannot remember where I learnt these. But they have sung in my head for twenty years, and perhaps, alas ! even more.

I am very busy anthologizing. I cannot get on with my work unless these and similar queries are answered. It is dictionary work. I want the birthplaces mentioned, and, in some cases, I fear the final resting-places, of these lesser -known poets. I shall, I am afraid, worry your readers with a batch of further queries. PERCY ADDLESHAW.

Hassocks, Sussex.

ARMORIAL BEARINGS SOUGHT. Can any" body inform me what are the armorial bearings of the families in the subjoined list ? The names are all those of ladies who married noblemen and gentlemen prior to 1600. They are not to be found (as written) in Burke, Rietstap, D'Eschavannes, or < Iwillim :

Badlington, m. Geoffrey Dormer, fifteenth cent.


Batail, m. Sir Wm. Douglas, thirteenth cent.

Orvyle or Aurevale, m. Adam le Port, temp. Hen. II.

Whitchester or Whytchestre, m. Sir John Manners, fifteenth cent.

De Vitrei, m. Wm. de Evereux, 2nd Earl of Salisbury, thirteenth cent.

De Humet, m. Baldwin Wake, thirteenth cent.

De Brionis, m. Hubert de Vaux, Lord of Gillesland, temp. Hen. I.

Lespec, m. Peter de Ros, temp. Hen. I.

Fandles (Spain), m. Sir Edmund Mortimer, d. 1303.

Maminot, m. Geoffrey de Say, thirteenth cent.

Talvace, m. Wm. de Warren, 3rd Earl of Surrey, twelfth cent.

Murdach, m. John Deincourt, temp. Hen. II.

De Haya, m. Oliver Deincourt, thiiteenth cent.

Credonia, m. Maurice de Berkeley, d. 1281. G. H. PALMER.

Heywood Park, White Waltham, Berkshire.

EPITAPHS : " THE ERTHE GOETH ON THE ERTHE." The Saturday Westminster Gazette of 20 Nov. last quoted a fine epitaph from " a tombstone in Melrose." I should like to ask the name and date of the deceased whose tomb it adorns. It runs as follows : The Erthe goeth on the Erthe

Glistning like Gold The Erthe goeth to the Erthe

Sooner than it wold The Erthe buildeth on the Erthe

Castles and Towers The Erthe says to the Erthe All shall be ours.

In the penultimate line " says " should be " saith," otherwise surely this is a poem. JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT. [Much information on this early English poem will be found at 11 S. i. 48, 116, 156, and the references there cited.]

SONG WANTED. I desire to find out who is the author of the following song, and where I can see a printed copy, as I certainly once did. It begins somewhat on this wise :

John Smith was a navvy strong and

With muscles of steel and It is a skit on a scheme once proposed at Oxford to bring working-men thither to be educated. The hero of the song gives up his spade, and prosecutes his studies at Oxford ; but when he has ended them he discovers too late that he cannot earn much as a graduate of the University, while his