2nd s. VII. Ariiiu 16. '59.1 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



315 



below the three steps of the high altar, represent- 

 ing Moses, David, Joshua, Sampson and Judas 

 Maccabeus. About forty years afterwards, Mat- 

 teo de Siena began a fine pavement of musaic 

 work below the altar of the crucifix representing 

 the murder of the Innocents. The twelve Sybils 

 were executed in the same manner about the year 

 1500. 



Since that period the art of picturing in musaic 

 has been brought to great perfection in Italy. 

 Pope Clement VIII., in the early part of the 

 seventeenth century, caused many fine works in 

 musaic to be executed in various parts of St. 

 Peter's in the Vatican by the best artists, among 

 •whom were Paolo Rosetti and Francesco Zucchi. 



Among the existing remains of musaic pave- 

 ments and decorations of walls and soffites, are 

 those discovered in a saloon of Hadrian's villa at 

 Tivoli ; those of Prseneste ; some fine specimens at 

 the villa Albani in Urbino. In 1763, one was 

 found in a villa near Pompeii, supposed to have 

 belonged to the Emperor Claudius, representing 

 three female figures, with comic masks, playing 

 musical instruments. The name of the artist, 

 Dioscorldes, is inscribed in the work in Greek 

 characters. 



It were but a matter of time to draw up a cata- 

 logue of ancient musaic still in existence long 

 enough for a one-and-twenty days' sale by Messrs. 

 Christie and Manson. As a proof, I refer the in- 

 quiring reader to Ciampini on the Musaics of Sa- 

 cred and Profane Buildings, Rome, 2 vols, folio, 

 and to scores of other works by Caylus, Mon- 

 faucon, Kircher, Barthelemy, Visconti, &c. Of 

 modern workers in musaic, besides the before- 

 mentioned Andrea Taffi, are Gaddo Gaddi, who 

 died in 1312, Giotto in 1336, Ghirldaio in 1493, 

 Pietro Oda in 1500, Francesco and Valerio Zuc- 

 chari about 1550, and many others ; some of whom 

 were painters as well as workers in musaic. 



If musaic art had been practised in ancient 

 Rome with the skill it afterwards obtained in 

 Italy and Byzantine Greece, and the Patricians 

 had employed such artists in making copies of the 

 great works of their predecessors then in being, 

 the world might have been gratified through ages 

 long passed away down to the present day, with 

 exact imitations of the master-works of Apelles, 

 Zeuxis, Protogenes and other mighty geniuses of 

 the pictorial art. 



Britain neither wants wealth nor ability. Let, 

 then, some of our great, not large only, bu* really 

 great pictures, portraits of our grandees, and such 

 like fragile gems, be indurated in musaic copies ; 

 say, for instance, size for size, Correggio's " Christ 

 on the Mount" in the National Gallery, or Quin- 

 tin Matsys' " Two Misers " in Windsor Castle. 



James Elmes. 



20. Burney Street, Greenwich. 



Bishop Burnet. — 



" Quomodo legeuda sit Burnetti Historia sui Tempoiis, 

 et pro vera admittenda." 



" Leguntur Hebraeaj verso ordine literse; 

 Cancrique serpunt in contrarium gradus ; 

 Tenella Virgo, si quern amet perdite 

 (Ea est protervitas) fugit tanquam oderit ; 

 Quemque odit Aulicus (tanta est urbanitas) 

 Atnore abundans, quasi studiosus edit. 

 Ut Hebrajae legi, cancros ut gradi, vides, 

 Tenella ut odit Virgo, amatque ut Aulicus, 

 Ilac lege Lucianus ilistoriam suam, 

 Suam Burnetus ipse, verarn dixerit." 



R. Moss, Decan. Elieiis. 

 I copied the above from a fly-leaf in the first 

 volume of Burnet's History of his Own Times, 

 12mo., London, 1725. The ink and handwriting 

 are old. If the Dean's " Monition" has not been 

 printed, it may be worth preserving as a sample 

 of taste and judgment. H. B. C. 



U. U. Club. 



[This epigram is printed in a facetious work, entitled 

 Newmarket, or an Essay on the Turf, in 2 vols. Lond. 8vo. 

 1771 : see vol. ii. p. 71. This work was edited by the 

 Rev. Philip Parsons, rector of Snave and Eastwell, and 

 minister of \Wjq in Kent. The epigram is also printed 

 and noticed in Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, i. C61. ; iv. 

 23y.] 



Ancient Inheritances. — The following newspaper 

 paragraph seems worthy of preservation in " N. 

 & Q." : — 



" The interesting statement made by Lord Palmerston, 

 respecting the uninterrupted descent from father to son 

 of a small estate in the New Forest, relates to the family 

 of Purkiss, the lime-burner, who picked up the body of 

 the Red King, and carried it in his humble cart to Win- 

 chester. But a case of still longer descent in persons not 

 allied to rank or fortune may be quoted. At Ambrose's 

 Barn, on the bordera of Thorp, near Chertsey, resides a 

 farmer, Mr. Wapshot, whose ancestors have lived on the 

 same spot ever since the time of Alfred the Great, by 

 whom the farm was granted to Reginald Wapshot. 

 There are several untitled families among our gentry 

 who can trace their names and possessions to the Saxon 

 time." 



CUTHBERT BeDE. 



Mid-Lent at Seville. — 



" We have still the remnants of an ancient custom 

 this day which shews the impatient feelings with which, 

 men sacrifice their comforts to the fears of superstition : 

 children of all ranks, those of the poor in the streets, and 

 those of the better classes in their houses, appear fantas- 

 tically decorated, not unlike the English chimney- 

 sweepers on Mayday, with caps of gilt and coloured 

 paper, and coats made of the Crusade Bulls of the preced- 

 ing year. In this attire they keep up an incessant din 

 the whole day, crying, as they sound their drums and 

 rattles, 'Aserrar la vieja, la picara pelleja,' ' Saw down the 

 old woman, the roguish b h.' About midnight par- 

 ties of the common people parade the streets, knocking at 

 everj' door, and repeating the same words. I understand 

 that they end this revel by sawing in two the figure of 

 an old woman, \Yliich is meant as the emblem of Lent." 

 — Doblado's Letters from Spain, p. 243. 



E. H. A. 



