June 26. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



61$ 



acted in any one of these but once in a fortnight, the 

 house was filled as at a new play, especially Alexander; 

 he acting that with such grandeur and agreeable majesty, 

 that one of the Court was pleased to honour him with 

 this commendation ; that Hart might teach any king 

 on earth how to comport himself." * 



In Rymer's Dissertation on Tragedy he is thus 

 noticed : 



" The eyes of the audience are prepossessed and 

 charmed by his action, before aught of the poet can 

 approach their ears ; and to the most wretched of 

 characters Hart gives a lustre which dazzles the sight, 

 that the deformities of the poet cannot be perceived." 



" He was no less inferior in Comedy ; as Mosca, in 

 the Fox; Don John, in the Chances; Wildblood, in 

 the Mock Astrologer; with sundry other parts. In all 

 the Comedies and Tragedies he was concerned, he per- 

 form'd with that exactness and perfection that not any 

 of his successors have equall'd him." f 



It would seem that through Hart's " excellent 

 action" alone Ben Jonson's Catiline (his own 

 favourite play), which had been condemned on 

 its first representation, was kept on the stage 

 during the reign of Charles II. With Hart this 

 play died. 



Previous to Nell Gwyn's elevation to royal fa- 

 vour, it is said, upon the authority of Sir George 

 Etherge, in Lives of the most celebrated Beauties, 

 Sfc, 1715, she was " protected" by Lacy, and af- 

 terwards by Hart. Whether this be true or not, 

 it is certain that she received instructions in the 

 Thespian art from both of these gentlemen. 



The cause of Hart retiring from the stage was 

 in consequence of his being dreadfully afflicted 

 with the stone and gravel, "of which he died 

 sometime after, having a salary of forty shillings 

 a week to the day of his death. " 



Hart's Christian name was Charles. He is be- 

 lieved by Malone to have been Shakspeare's great 

 nephew.J 



Major Mohun remained in the " United Com- 

 pany" after Hart's retirement. 



" He was eminent for Volpone ; Face, in the Alche- 

 mist; Melantius, in the Maid's Tragedy; Mardonius, 

 in King arid no King; Cassius, in Julius Ccesar ; Clytus, 

 in Alexander; Mithridates, &c. An eminent poet§ 

 seeing him act this last, vented suddenly this saying : 

 ' Oh, Mohun, Mohun ! thou little man of mettle, if I 

 should write 100 plays, I'd write a part for thy mouth.' 

 In short, in all his parts, he was most accurate and 

 correct." || , 

 V Rymer remarks : 



" We may remember (however we find this scene of 

 Melanthius and Amintor written in the book) that at 



* Roscius Anglicanus, p. 23. 



t Ibid., p. 24. 



^ See Historical Account of the English Stage, in 

 jVIalone's edition of Shakspeare, vol. i. part ii. p. 278. 

 Lend. 1790. 



§ Thought by Thomas Davies to have been Lee. 



II Roscius Anglicanus. 



the Theater we have a good scene acted ; there is work 

 cut out, and both our iEsopus and Roscius are on the 

 stage together. Whatever defect may be in Amintor 

 and Melanthius, Mr. Hart and Mr. Mohun are wanting 

 in nothing. To these we owe what is pleasing in the 

 scene ; and to this scene we may impute the success of 

 the ' Maid's Tragedy,^ " 



Major Mohun's Christian name was Michael. 



W.H.Ln. 

 Berwick-on- Tweed. 



BURIAL WITHOUT RELIGIOUS SERVICE BURIAL. 



(Vol. v., pp. 466. 549.) 



There can be no doubt, I think, that a burial 

 ground, whether parish churchyard or cemetery, 

 so long as it has been consecrated, or even licensed 

 by the bishop, is only legally useable for interments 

 performed according to " the ecclesiastical laws of 

 this realm;" i.e. the burial service, as rubrically 

 directed, must be read by a clergyman over the 

 corpse. Whether the bishop would have pro- 

 ceeded by law against the clergyman in Carlile's 

 case, supposing he had desisted from the service 

 under the protests of the sons, may be questioned ; 

 but that he could have done so is beyond a doubt. 

 The sixty-eighth canon says, that " no minister 

 shall refuse or delay to bury any corpse that is 

 brought to the church or churchyard .... in such 

 manner and form as is prescribed in the Book of 

 Common Prayer. And if he shall refuse, &c., he 

 shall be suspended by the bishop of the diocese 

 from his ministry by the space of three months." 

 The consecration, or episcopal licence, seems to tie 

 the burial ground to the burial service, except in 

 the three cases of persons who die excommunicated, 

 unbaptized, or by their own hands ; and I imagine 

 that a clergyman would render himself liable t» 

 suspension by his bishop, who either allowed in- 

 terments to take place in the churchyard without 

 the burial service, or, on the other hand, used the 

 service in unconsecrated or unlicensed ground. 

 By the 3 Ja. I. c. 5., there is a penalty for burying 

 a corpse away from the church ; but this law is 

 either repealed or obsolete. If any services of the 

 church be used by a clergyman, except " according 

 to order," I imagine that he renders himself liable 

 to penal consequences ; but it may be sometimes 

 thought best to omit them. Sometimes, however, 

 as in the case of baptisms being allowed in draw- 

 ing-rooms, there is such an intentional oversight 

 as is quite indefensible. 



The story which I have heard of Baskerville's 

 burial is as follows ; — He died at Birmingham, 

 but was not interred, and his corpse was kept in 

 the house in which he had lived. After a time 

 this house was sold, and the purchaser of it be- 

 came embarrassed by the unexpected discovery 

 that he was in possession of the old printer's 

 mortal remains. He applied to the clergyman of 



