2nd s. VII. Mar. 19. '59.1 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



229 



LONDON, SATURDAY. MARCH 19. 1859. 



No 168.— CONTENTS. 



Vorsst— 

 " The Shepherd's Tale of the Pouder-PIott" 

 Kalph Cudworth, by J. E. B. Mayor - 

 Weapon Salve -------- 



Milton's Genealopry. by Hyde Clarke . . - - 



Uryden, by Geo. Bob. Vine ------ 



Changes in Language and Orthography - - . . 



MiNixK NoTKs : — City Heraldry — To fix Tracings on Oiled Paper 



— Eliminate; Elimination; Layman —Spenser 



4(^RaiRs : — 

 W. Coddington, Sir H. Vane, &c. by Pishey Thompson - 



Minor Qukbiks s — " The battle is fought," &c Portrait of Ley- 

 den— Sea-shore Sand— Hernldic Query— Hobhouse — Arms of 

 Ilayter— Philosopher quoted by South- Unknown Portrait, &c. 



BIiNon QuKuiEs WITH Answers : — " Letters of the Herbert Fa- 

 mily" — Daborne — Friedbert at Naxos— Andrew Johnson— 

 Stow's " Annals," &c. ------- 



Krplirs ; — 

 Governor Hutchinson's MSS., by P. Hutchinson - - - 



Handel's mode of Composing . _ - - - 



The Donnes of Kadnorshire, &c., by John Donne - - - 



Juries, I)y James Morrin ------ 



The Crown of France offered to tlie Duke of Wellington, by Eev. 

 Tliomns Boys - - - -- 



Repmus to Minor Qdebiks! — Richard Syinonds — Faunes Family 



— Old China— Curious Charge of Treason — The Land of Gold 



— Hatchments in Churches — Damn the Mature of Things, &c. - 



Notes on Books, &c. ....... 



Page 



- 229 



- 230 



" THE shepherd's TALE OF THE POUDER-PLOTT." 



At the close of Mr. Monck Mason's Life of 

 Bishop Bedell (8vo. London, 1843), occurs the 

 following passage : — 



" Mr. Clogy informs us that Bishop Bedell read an- 

 nually from the pulpit, before his sermon on the 5th Nov., 

 a letter, which he received from London, while he was 

 preacher at St. Edmundsbury, about the discovery of the 

 gunpowder plot, with all the circumstances of it, and, 

 after supper, he constantly read on the same day an ex- 

 cellent poem, which be wrote at that time, called the 

 Shepherd's Tale ; being a poetical dialogue between cer- 

 tain shepherds concerning that plot, in the old dialect of 

 Chaucer, and two or three sheets of paper; 'you may see 

 it (he continues) with his Latin letters to Mr. John Dury, 

 about the pacification of the Reformed Churches.' " 



Seventy-one years after the death of the good 

 bishop, there appeared a small Svo. volume (pp. 

 30.) with this title : — 



" A Protestant Memorial : or, The Shepherd's Tale of 

 the Pouder-Plott. A Poem in Spenser's style. Written 

 by the Right Reverend D'' William Bedell, Lord Bishop 

 of Kilmore, in Ireland. Published from an Original Ma- 

 nuscript, found among the Papers of the late D'' Dilling- 

 ham, Master of Emmanuel College, in Cambridge. To 

 which is prefixed an Extract of the Author's Life, written 

 by Gilbert, Lord Bishop of Sarum. London: Printed for 

 J. Roberts, near the Oxford-Arms, in Warwick-lane. 

 Mnc(;xiii." 



According to Malone, two copies only of this 

 Tale are extant. In the one, which was formerly 

 in his own possession, he has jotted on the fly- 

 leaf :- 



" This poem is so extremely rare, that I have never 

 seen but this copy, and one in the Bodleian Librarj'. A 

 MS. copy (but not the author's) is yet in that Library. 

 The words 'Protestant Memorial' were not in the ori- 

 ginal title-page. They were added on the Publication in 



1712, I believe by Dr. Rawlinson, who, I think, was the 



Editor." 



I will describe, as briefly as possible, the con- 

 tents of this "rare" volume. After the Life of 

 the author, which is condensed, as the title-page 

 intimates, from the well-known Memoir by Bur- 

 net, follows three stanzas (In Autorem), subscribed 

 "Jos. Hall" ("afterwards Bp. of Norwich," adds 

 Malone) : the first of which may be taken as a fair 

 sample of " the old dialei;t of Chaucer," or of 

 " Spenser's style" redivivus : — 



" Willy, thy Rhythms so sweetly run and rise, 

 And answer rightly to thy tunefull Reed, 

 That (so mought both our fleecy Cares succeed) 



I ween (nor is it any vaine Device) 

 That Collin * dying, his Immortal Muse 

 Into thy Learned Breast did late infuse." 



(The adverb " late," in the last line, appears to 

 have sorely puzzled Malone ; for he has set a mark 

 against it, and another in the margin, but he 

 lacked courage or ability to add a note.) 



Then follows a poetical dedication " to his 

 Majesty," in four stanzas of seven lines each, 

 " Chanten good King Jemies name." 



The "poem " is in the form of a dialogue, and 

 the principal interlocutor is, one Willy ; who de- 

 livers to his two companions, Thenot and Perkin, 

 a tedious relation ( or " tale") of the origin, pro- 

 gress, and decay of the Roman empire, and the 

 rise of the Papacy, or Babylon, on its ruins. The 

 " Pouder-Plott" occupies comparatively but a 

 small place in his story. The " Poem" concludes, 

 rather abruptly, with a paraphrase of the cxxiv 

 psalm, which is the only redeeming passage in the 

 book. 



I am at a loss to conceive how Malone could 

 have mistaken this execrable production for the 

 work of the "gentle shepherd" of Kilmore. The 

 gross vulgarity (I might almost say, the low scur- 

 rility,) of the whole performance, is alone suffi- 

 cient to stamp it as an impudent cheat. 



The difficulty, however, of adopting Malone's 

 judgment in this instance is as nothing compared 

 to that of reconciling the well-authenticated move- 

 ments and labours of the bishop, in his early life, 

 with the above statements, advanced upon the 

 authority of Mr. Clogy, in reference to the com- 

 position, &c., of The Shephe7'd's J'alc. 



Bedell quitted Cambridge in 1599 for St. Ed- 

 mundsbury ; in which last-mentioned place he 

 continued until the spring of 1604, when he ac- 

 companied Sir Henry Wotton as his chaplain to 

 Venice. He remained abroad eight years, or until 

 1612. The gunpowder conspii-acy was detected 

 in Nov. 1605, or twenty months at least after his 

 departure for the Continent. It is manifest, there- 

 fore, that he could not have "received a letter 

 from London, while he was a preacher at St. Ed- 

 mundsbury, about the discovery of the gunpowder 

 plot, ivith all the circumstances of it." 



* Spenser. 



