Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 3.djvu/217

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ii s. IIL MAK. is, i9ii.] NOTES AND QUERIES.


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who died in Salem (U.S.) in 1646; his estate being administered by Thoma? Wickes or Weekes, whose wife Alice and children were afterwards found in occupancy of the real estate there (see Waters' s * Glean- ings,' p. 122, Brit. Mus. 9905 e. 5).

ETHEL LEGA-WEEKES.


"THE ALMIGHTY DOLLAR ' s (11 S. iii. 109, 179). The passage in Washington Irving alluded to in the query appears to be the following: "The 'almighty dollar,' that great object of universal devotion throughout our land, seems to have no genuine devotees in these peculiar villages n (Washington Irving, ' Creole Village,' quoted in Barrere and Leland's ' Slang Dictionary,' i. 31). In the list of Irving's works pub- lished by Bohn no such title as the ' Creole Village ' appears. Of course, there must be such a publication, but what is it t It is somewhat surprising that even the laborious Allibone, in his exhaustive account of Irving's writings, mentions only 'The Adventures of Captain Bonneville ' as having been published in 1837. Would MB. THORN- TON kindly say by what other name the ' Creole Village ' is known 1 S. S. W.

MR. THORNTON has raised a nice point, yet I think it can be settled. He says that this phrase appears in Irving's " ' Creole Village,' 1837, and he vindicates it in a foot-note from the charge of irreverence." It should be stated, however, to avoid all uncertainty, that ' Creole Village ' was not published by Irving himself until 1855, when it appeared in his ' Wolfert's Roost,' and that the vindication to which MR. THORNTON alludes was first printed in that volume. In his 'Life and Letters of W. Irving' P. M. Irving says (iii. 99) that ' Creole Village ' was " contributed to an annual (' The Magnolia ').... edited by that brilliant but unfortunate Englishman, Henry [W.] Herbert [' Frank Forrester ']." The story filled pp. 315-26 of ' The Magnolia ' for 1837. This bears no date on the title-page, but was copyrighted in 1836. The Knickerbocker for October, 1836, contained an account of

  • The Magnolia,' from which the following

passages are taken :

" The ' Magnolia.' This popular annual, for 1831, if we may judge from the plates and those portions of the matter comprising nearly the whole which we have examined, will prove to be the best specimen of this species of ornamental literature ever published in this country. .. .We subjoin an admirable tale of chivalry, from the pen of Washington Irving simply adding, that, rich as it is, it is not superior to another article from


the same eminent source, contained in the ' Magnolia.' .... [Here follows ' The Widow's Ordeal.'] The ' Magnolia ' will be published in the course of the ensuing month, and we shall embrace another occasion to allude more specifi- cally to its separate merits." Viii. 489-94.

The promised review appeared in The Knickerbocker for November (viii. 598- 605), and we read that " ' The Creole Village,' by Washington Irving, is so characteristic and admirable, that we cannot resist the temptation to transfer it entire." As The Knickerbocker printed one story from ' The Magnolia ' before that annual was published, it is quite possible that ' Creole Village ' was also printed in the newspapers or in some other magazine before the appearance of ' The Magnolia.' At all events, it certainly appeared in The Knickerbocker for November, 1836, and presumably that number was issued during that month.

ALBERT MATTHEWS. Boston, U.S.

The idea of this phrase, at any rate, is much older than the time of Washington Irving. Ben Jonson's ' Epistle to Elizabeth, Countess of Rutland,' commences thus :

Whilst that for which all virtue now is sold, And almost every vice, cdmightie gold.

T. SHEPHERD.

SMALLPOX AND THE STARS (US. iii. 167). The seventeenth-century poet is John Dryden, who, while still at Westminster School, wrote an elegy 'Upon the Death of the Lord Hastings ' in memory of a school- fellow, the eldest son of the Earl of Hunting- don, who died of smallpox in 1649. The piece was first published in the same year in ' Lachrymse Musarum,' a collection of verses on Lord Hastings' s death. It is included in modern collected editions of Dryden's poems, e.g., W. D. Christie's, pp. 333-6 (1900). See also the beginning of H. A. Taine's account of Dryden in his

  • History of English Literature.'

EDWARD BENSLY.

Dryden's memorial poem * Upon the Death of Lord Hastings ' is that of which A. S. P. is in search. One of Dryden's editors says that the event occurred in the noble- man's twentieth year, " and on the day preceding that which had been appointed for the celebration of his marriage." After some rather strange imagery, designed to give poetical dignity to the effects of the fatal disorder, the poet proceeds thus :

Or were these gems sent to adorn his skin,

The cabinet of a richer soul within ? _ No comet need foretell his change drew on,

Whose corpsemight seem a constellation.