May 22. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



487 



Emeriti. 



POEM BY NICHOLAS BKETON. 



I have recently purchased a small manuscript in 

 quarto, containing fifteen leaves, written about the 

 year 1590. which consists of a poem in six cantos, 

 without title or name of the author, but which, I 

 feel convinced, from the style, is one of the nume- 

 rous works of Nicholas Breton. In the hope that 

 some of your correspondents may be able to iden- 

 tify the poem, which may possibly be printed in 

 some of Breton's very rare works, I subjoin the 

 commencing stanzas : 



" Where should I finde thiit melancholy muse, 

 Tliat never hard of any thinge but mone, 

 And reade the passiones that her pen dotli use, 



Wlien she and sorrow sadlye sitt alone 

 To tell the world more then the world can tell 

 What fits indeed most fitlye figure hell. 



*' Lett me not thinke once of the smalest thought 

 May speake of less then of the greatest gref, 

 Wher every sence with sorrowes overwrought 



Lives but in death, dispayrlng of relef, 

 While thus the harte with torments torne asunder 

 Maye of the worlde be cal'd the wofuU wonder." 



These two stanzas are by no means favourable 

 specimens of the entire poem, but I prefer to give 

 them, because the work itself may be printed. If 

 it appears, on inquiry, to be still inedited, I may 

 venture to submit a few other extracts from it of 

 a more illustrative character. Our bibliographers 

 would be more useful guides, were they always to 

 give the first lines of old poems. I have a toler- 

 ably good library, but can find no work sufliciently 

 descriptive of Breton's works to enable me to trace 

 the above. H. 



THE VIRTUOSI, OR ST. LUKE S CLUB. 



Where is to be found that intensely interesting 

 MS. Lot 120., Sixth D ly's Sale, at Strawberry 

 Hill, a folio tract entitle! The "Virtuosi,"' or St. 

 Lukes Club, held at the Rose Tavern, first esta- 

 hlished by Sir Anthony Vandyke ; with Autographs 

 of all the eminent Artists of the day ? 



Such is the account of Mr. George Robins, to 

 the sound of whose hammer it fell, let us hope, 

 into worthy hands. 



By the. aid of a note made whilst the several 

 precious contents of that "Gothic Vatican of 

 Greece and Rome," as I think Pope described it, 

 were on view, I hope to whet the appetite of some 

 of our literary vultures : 



" Rose Tavern, Mar. 5. 1 697. 

 " An order for raising an annual fund for pictures ; 

 with twenty names of stewards." 



What say you, Mr. Editor, to such subscribing 

 parties as, among others, " Grinling Gibbons, 



Michael Dahl, J. Closterman, and Christopher 

 Wren?" I cannot remember more, but I think 

 " Alex. Verrio " was among them. 



Mem. the second : as entries in a sort of journal : 



«' That our steward, John Chicheley, Esquire, gave 

 us this day a Westphalia Ham, which had been omitted 

 in his entertainment on St. Luke's day." 



Again : 



" Paid and spent at Spring Gardens, by Knights- 

 bridge, forfeiture - - - £3 15 shys." 



Why, Mr. Editor here are the new Roxburgh 

 Revels of the Knights of the Brush and Palette. 

 And now that the Chancellor of the Exchequer 

 of the day is expected to take out his diploma, 

 and the ex-Premier is to be the new Professor of 

 Perspective, vice the author of the Fallacies of 

 Hope, it becomes a question of prevailing interest, 

 which I commend to the research of your dilet- 

 tanti querists. It may be a thread of connexion 

 witli those stores of precious materials obtained by 

 Walpole from the widow of that persevering in- 

 vestigator George Virtue. J. H. A. 



THE RABBIT AS A SYMBOL. 



The 29th vol. of the Archceologia contains an 

 interesting " description of a monumental effigy of 

 Richard Coeur de Lion, recently discovered in the 

 cathedral of Notre Dame at Rouen," by Alfred 

 Way, Esq., who, with his usual precision, has 

 noticed whut he very properly calls " some sin- 

 gular details " beneath the figure of the lion 

 crouching at the king's feet ; among these details 

 is " the head of a rabbit * peeping out of its 

 burrow, and, a little above, a dog warily watching 

 the mouth of the hole." Mr. Way adds : 



" I have met with nothing among the accessory or- 

 naments of monumental sculpture analogous to this ; 

 and though convinced that what in itself may appear 

 a trifling detail, was not placed here without design, I 

 am quite at a loss to conjecture what could have been 

 its import." 



The same symbol or device, well known to all 

 lovers of ancient wood-engraving, appears in some 

 of tiie earliest specimens of that art. It is found 

 in an Impression of one of the oldest known play- 

 ing-cards, representing the knave of diamonds, 

 now in the print-room of the British Museum, of 

 which a fac-simile is inserted at p. 214. of Chat- 

 to's History of Playing Cards. Another instance 

 of this device occurs (without the dog) in an old 

 woodcut, dated 1418, discovered a few years ago 

 at Malines, of which a copy appeared in the 

 Athenaum of Oct. 4, 1845. And a third example 

 is contained in that celebrated and unique wood- 

 cut of St. Christopher, dated 1423, in the posses- 



* Mr. Way says a hare or rabbit, forgetting that the 

 hare does not burrow. 



