Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/379

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ii s. vi. OCT. 19, i9i2.] NOTES AND QUERIES.


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not composed them. His friend, never doubting but that the author of the verses was before him, retained them as a souvenir. In after years Person's nephew represented his uncle as the real author, and the Editor of The Morning Post of the day had promptly to disillusionize him.* Of course, Southey was terribly enraged at such a preposterous claim. He was too proud of his share in the achievement to allow any one to pilfer the glory that was his. The verse in which he drags in Person's name shows the license of controversy in those days. But Person himself would be the last to take offence.' 5

The scurrilous lines of Southey, who gave the piece the title of ' The Devil's Walk,' are printed in The Morning Post, as well as in 'N. & Q.,' 3 S. ix. 197. The edition mentioned by MR. PARSON was one of a series of diableries, such as 'The DeviTs Visit,' ' The Devil's Progress,' &c., which were issued in the early " thirties " with Robert Cruikshank's illustrations. It was, of course, quite unauthorized by either Coleridge or Southey. Montagu was pro- bably the assumed name of some pub- lishers' hack. W. F. PRIDEAUX.

" The Devil's Walk : a Poem by S. T. Cole- ridge and B. Southey (or rather by Southey, with a few Stanzas added by Coleridge). Edited, with a Biographical Memoir (of Professor Person) and Notes, by H. W. Montagu. Second Edition. (Facetiae, &c. Illustrated by Robert Cruikshank, vol. ii.) London, 1831, 12mo."

"Ten Etchings illustrative of 'The Devil's Walk ' (a Poem by B. Southey and Samuel Taylor Coleridge). London, 1831, folio." I quote above from the Bibliography appended to ' The Life of S. T. Coleridge/ by Hall Caine, 1887, p. iv.

" I send you the ' Devil's Walk,' but am almost doubtful whether you can decipher the detestable character in which it is scrawled and scratched rather than written. It has been lying on my table some three weeks before I could make up my stomach to send it." B. Southey to G. C. Bedford, Feb. 24, 1827, ' Selections from the Letters of Bpbert Southey,' edited by J. Wood Warter, vol. iv. p. 51, 1856.

The following from another letter by Southey is added by the editor as a note :

" This alludes to the enlarged copy, which I was led to do by the confident assertions still put forth that Porson was the author of that delectable poem." Letter to G. C. Bedford, 14 Jan., 1827.

The editor goes on to say :

" It may be added here that Southey gave the original scrawl written at Nether Stowey to Miss Caroline Bowles (afterwards Mrs. Southey), and she left it to Mrs. Warter, in whose posses- sion it now is." -

Mrs. Warter was Southey's eldest daughter, Edith. WM. H. PEET.


  • This claim afterwards turned out to be a

hoax.


PETER DEWiNT(ll S. iii. 368,418; iv. 93). Though it is not parallel with the instance given at the last reference, I may be per- mitted to cite a curious item relative to De Wint's work. Exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum (on loan from the National Gallery) is a water-colour by De Wint, ' Roman Canal, Lincolnshire,' size 9fx21, and, as is usual with his works, bearing no signature of the artist. I possess a water-colour drawing of precisely the same subject, but larger, the size being 12JX2H, with the signature " David Cox, 1848, "as to which I have never been able to form a conclusion satisfactory to myself, and simply give the facts. W. B. H.

TRUSSEL FAMILY (US. v. 50, 137, 257, 333, 476 ; vi. 32, 216). A. C. C.'s reply is very interesting. Can he say who was the tenant, and who the mesne tenant, of Nuthurst and Lapworth in Domesday, and how these manors descended to Wm. Trussel ? If by a marriage, can he throw any light on the origin of the Trussels in the Conqueror's time ? The heraldic puzzle that while Swynnerton bore a black cross f ormee flory on white, some of those Trussels bore the same coat, excepting that their cross was red, remains unsolved. C. S.

HOGARTH'S ' RAKE'S PROGRESS ' : ' THE BLACK JOKE ' (11 S. vi. 189). A version of this tune, whether with words or not I do not know, is in the ' Petrie Collection of Ancient Music,' No. 574. Another version, formerly used as a Morris dance at Ilming- ton, Warwickshire, is given, so far as the tune is concerned, in ' Morris Dance Tunes.' Set II., New Edition (Novello). The dance is described, and some jingle words sung by the Ilmington Morris-men set down, in ' The Morris Book,' Part I., 2nd ed., 1912, by C. J. Sharp (the collector) and H. C. Macilwaine, p. 40. PERCEVAL LUCAS,

SACRED WELLS (US. vi. 190). Religious ceremony is still observed at Holy well, North Wales. S. D. C.


BREWERNE ABBEY (11 S. vi. 110, 177, 235). My friend the REV. A. L. MAYHEW points out to me that there is a Brewern Abbey in Oxfordshire. The name is there generally spelt " Bruern," but Dugdale (vol. v. p. 496) mentions only the grant to Sir Anthony Cope in 8 James I.

W. A. B. COOLIDGE. Grindelwald.