316 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2"d S. VII. April 16. '59. 



Avcient Epigram. — 



" Marmoreo Licinus tumulo jacet ; at Cato nullo, 

 Pompeius parvo. Quis putet esse Deos? 

 Saxa premunt Licinum, levat altum fama Catonem 

 Pompeium tituli. Credimus esse Deos." 



" O'er dead Licinus sculptured marbles rise ; 

 TJnburied, Cato, — meanly, Pompey lies. 



Is there a God ? 

 " His tomb but blazons forth Licinus' shame, 

 Cato's and Pompey's an undying Fame. 



There is a God." 



Niebuhr pronounces the above Latin a genuine 

 ancient epigram, and one of the most beautiful 

 that has come down to us. Who is the author ? 



A. B. R. 



Belmont. 



" Mother Carey's ChickeJis" — The following 

 fact may be interesting to some of your readers. 

 In the month of August last I was returning from 

 India in the Peninsular and Oriental Company's 

 steamer, " Hindostan," when a little to the east- 

 ward of the island of Socotra, I was looking over 

 the ship's bows as she cut her way through the 

 water, a number of these little birds emerged from 

 beneath the surface, and flew away as if frightened. 

 They could not have been asleep on the water, as 

 I saw them distinctly come out of it ; making a 

 noise resembling that produced by the sudden 

 lifting of a hand-net. 



W. S. Haevbt,'R.N., F.R.G.S., 

 H. M. Ship "Princess Royal." 



Malta. 



©uerfejj. 



THE BALLAD OP SIR ANDREW BARTON. 



The turning point of the naval battle between 

 Howard, Lord High Admiral of England, and this 

 celebrated pirate, has never as yet been satisfac- 

 torily explained. Can any of your readers throw 

 light upon it ? They will remember the ballad 

 tells us that when the admiral sailed to find his 

 enemy, he met a merchant, Henry Hunt, whose 

 ship had been plundered by Barton the preceding 

 day. He advises with Hunt as to the best way of 

 proceeding, and vows to capture the pirate and 

 bring him aboard. 



" The Merchant said, ' If you will do so, 



Take Counsel then I pray withal, 

 Let no Man to his Top-castle go. 



Nor strive to let his Beams down fall." 



The poet relates how the Lord Admiral found 

 the pirate ; how the battle began with the " pieces 

 of ordnance" — which must have been of some 

 weight as " one cruel shot killed fourteen men" — 

 till at length Barton, as a last resource, calls on 

 one of his men : — 



" Then did he on Gordion call, 

 Unto the Top-castle for to go, 

 And bid his Beams he should let fall, 

 For he greatly fear'd au Overthrow." 



Gordion proceeds to "swerve" (climb?) up the 

 mast tree, but the celebrated archer (for archers 

 at that time seem to have been the riflemen of the 

 navy, the hand-gun, with its rest, &c., being espe- 

 cially unwieldy on board ship,) William Horse- 

 ley is called, and shoots him in the attempt. The 

 pirate's nephew, and, at last, the pirate himself 

 make the same endeavour to " let the beams down 

 fall," and they share the same fate from Horse- 

 ley's arrows. The admiral then boards, and takes 

 the ship ; which must have been very large, as 

 they found 360 men still alive on board. The 

 only attempt at an explanation that I have heard 

 is, that the "beams" were large sticks of timber 

 drawn up to the yard-arms, and then suddenly 

 let fall down the other ship's hatchway to break 

 through her bottom, and so sink her. But first, 

 not to speak of the difiiculty of hitting the hatch- 

 way, a beam heavy enough to do this sort of exe- 

 cution must have been as long as the height of 

 the yard-arm, and consequently could not have 

 acquired impetus enough in the fall to knock a 

 hole in the bottom, apart from the clumsiness of 

 the whole contrivance. But second, we have this 

 objection : — It is surely as easy to hoist any 

 weight to the yard-arm from the deck as from 

 the top, and certainly as easy to let go the rope 

 that sustains it. Why, then, should they expose 

 their lives in going aloft to do what might quite 

 as well be done in safety on deck, and what was 

 the importance of the operation ? The same re- 

 marks apply with equal force to any attempt to lay 

 " beams " from one ship to another for the pur- 

 pose of boarding ; besides, in the stanza first 

 cited it seems to have been the wish and intention 

 of the English admiral to do this himself. In the 

 current number of the Gentleman's Magazine is a 

 complaint that we want more information on an- 

 cient shipping ; perhaps this Query may help to 

 direct the attention of some able antiquary to the 

 subject. A. A. 



Poets' Comer. 



Ballad Catalogues. — In an article on the RoX' 

 hurghe Ballads, contained in the North British 

 Review for Nov. 1846, the writer at its conclu- 

 sion says : " We can state with tolerable certainty 

 that It is in contemplation to draw up a separate 

 catalogue of the Ballads. Can you or any of 

 your numerous correspondents state whether this 

 has been done or not by the Museum authorities, 

 or any other party, and whether such catalogue has 

 been published ? * Also, whether any list, more 

 or less complete, has ever been published of the bal- 



[* Since 1846, each ballad has been separately entered 

 in the General Catalogue in the Reading Room ; but no 

 publication containing them has been issued.] 



