388 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 130. 



NOTE ON VIKGIL. 



" Ecce levts sumrtio de vertice visus liili 



Fundere lumen apex " 



^n. II. 682-3. 



The common translations of apex with its epi- 

 thet levis seem to me to be strangely deficient in 

 sense. I am anxious to submit an idea which has 

 occurred to me to the judgment of the riper 

 scholars whose well-known names are subscribed 

 to so many valuable articles in " N. & Q." The 

 Delphin note defines apex to be " summa pars 

 pilei," the conical termination of the bonnet worn 

 by liilus ; and in this all other comments on this 

 passage (at least with which I am acquainted) 

 seem to agree. But in what sense can any part of 

 a cap or bonnet be levis — light, flimsy, wortldess, 

 or capricious ? which I take to be the only mean- 

 ings of which levis is capable. Surely Virgil 

 would not be guilty of so meaningless an epithet 

 — of so palpable an instance of school-boy cram ? 

 Now, from a passage in Euripides, Phcen. 1270-4., 



" ifiTTvpovs t' UKfias 



(t'fl^ns t' ivci/xaiv, vypdrriT' ivavrlav, 

 &Kpav re AafiirdS' , ^ Suolv opovs ex*', 



it seems clear to me that Virgil meant, by levis 

 apex, a light, flickering, lambent, pyramidal flame, 

 the omen of success in the nvpoixauTeia. 



The nature of the flame which consumed the 

 sacrifice was one point which the haruspices, both 

 Greek and Roman, particularly observed in en- 

 deavouring to ascertain the will of the gods ; 

 hence the expressions e/xirvpa crt'ifiara, <p\oyaira, 

 arnxara. See Valckenaer on this very passage of 

 the PhoenissEe. E. S. Taylob, J3.A. 



Marftiam, Norfolk. 



MSS. OF DR. WHITBY, AND PETITION OF INHABITANTS 

 OF ALLINGTON, KENT. 



Perhaps some of your numerous readers may be 

 interested with the following Note : — A few weeks 

 since I met with at a stall a most beautifully- 

 written MS. commentary on the Second Epistle of 

 St. Paul to the Corinthians. The MS. was evi- 

 dently of the close of the seventeenth, or the first 

 three or four years of the eighteenth century. I 

 was much struck with its learning. At the end 

 were two sermons written in a different hand. 

 The commentary was scored and corrected by the 

 same hand the sermons vrere written in. These 

 latter were full of most copious extracts from the 

 Greek and Latin Fathers. The handwriting was 

 very remarkable. I discovered that the commen- 

 tary was that of Dr. Whitby, though differing in 

 several places from that published by him. By a 

 comparison with some of Dr. Whitby's letters in 

 the iiritish Museum (especially Add. MSS. 4276., 



fol. 194.), two learned fi-iends at once identified the 

 Doctor's handwriting, which is very peculiar in 

 the formation of some of the letters, and especially 

 from having a remarkable curve s_x. The two 

 sermons, I believe, have never been published. 

 Between the leaves of the MS. I found an old 

 letter, of which I send you a copy. The person 

 to whom it was addressed was Dr. Ellas Sydall, 

 subsequently, I believe, Bishop of Gloucester, 

 then chaplain to Archbishop Tenison. I know 

 not whether it has ever appeared in print before. 



" To the Pious and Rev* D' Sydall, Chaplain to his 

 Grace the Archbp. of Canterbury. 



" The humble petition of the Inhabitants of the Parish 

 of Aliington in Kent. 

 «S'. 

 " The sublime character his Grace did latelie bestow 

 on a irace of his own Chaplains, that he feared not, not 

 he, to turn them loose against any two preachers in Eng- 

 land, has rais'd so high an opinion of your person in all 

 men of sense and understanding, that you cannot 

 wonder to see yourself courted by us as the reigning 

 favourite at Lambeth ; be pleas'd, therefore, when 

 business of State or the care of the Church aford his 

 Grace some minutes of leisure, to represent our deplor- 

 able case to Him : we are now as a flock without a 

 Shepheard, and are inform'd by a threat'ning Emissary, 

 who came latelie down only to scatter terror through 

 our fields, that my L'^ designs to thrust a young looker 

 amongst us, who, tho' fit to be an Amanuensis, should 

 the dreadfuU times of Pulton* return, yet knows not 

 yet what doctrine He should give, nor what tithes He 

 should receive. Good S% put his Lordship in mind 

 that our Fathers had once here the great Erasmus, & 

 that our living should not be the portion of Sucklings: 

 His Grace's singular affection to the Church will en- 

 cline him, we hope, to consider our case, and we entreat 

 you to favor it with your gracious countenance ; and 

 your Petitioners will, as in duty bound, pray to God 

 that he will be pleas'd to translate one of the Preben- 

 daries to Heaven, to make room for you before it is too 

 late. 



"f™-^"?^''^^^'f Churchwardens. 

 John Stam, \ 



"Will. Sokes. Tim. Pledget. 



Hum, Terryl. Ch. Douhty. 



Matt. Parker, W. Rest. 



X Will. Soper." 

 his mark. 



I transcribe the letter verbatim et literatim. 

 There is no date ; but the writing is very old, 

 evidently of the early part of the eighteenth cen- 

 tury. Perhaps some of your readers can throw 

 light upon the subject referred to. Does anybody 

 know of more portions of Dr. Whitby's commen- 

 tary in MS. ? Richard Hooper. 



St. Stephen's, Westminster. 



"* The A.B. disputed in K. James' time against 

 Fulton the Jcsuite, who prov'd too hard for Him." 



