2"d s. X. Dec. 22. '60.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



489 



Noe other newes hath happen'd since 

 My coming here, of consequence. 

 Thus much in' haste to let j'ou know 

 Our safetyes onelj', and how wee doe. 

 Sir, were I not so buisy aboard 

 The Bark, I had sent exacter word; 

 If, therefore, what I've writt in matter, 

 Or forme bee weake, 'twas writt by water ; 

 Now let it serve, when I send o're 

 John Hodge's boat, I'll tell vou more. 



" Yo''s faithfully devoled 

 " To serve you 



" P. Ff. 

 ' From Loughe Bagge, 

 alias the Church Iland, 

 Feb. 4'\ 1643." 



n. 



MR. B. LEIGH SOTHEBY'S PROJECTED VOLUMES 

 ON EARLY BRITISH BIBLIOGRAPHY. 



In the fifteenth day's sale, July 14, 1858, of the 

 library of Dr. Bliss, by Messrs. Leigh Sotheby 

 and Wilkinson, there were several early printed 

 tracts of John Taylor, the Water Poet ; amongst 

 •which. No. 4194, is A Brief Remembrance of all 

 the English Monarchs, with their Raignes, ^c, 

 from the Norman Conquest, London, 1622, 8vo. 



In a MS. note in the autograph of Dr. Bliss, he 

 observes : — 



" This is the copy of Taylor which Mr. Grenville says 

 Woodburn asked more than 121. 12s. for! It is exceed- 

 ingly rare, being, as I fancy, the only copy yet seen, 

 with the set of whole-length portraits. It was presented 

 to me by Sam. Woodburn in commemoration of the pur- 

 chase of the Lawrence Michael Angelo and Rttffaele 

 drawings for the University galleries." 



" I close this notice," adds Dr. Bliss, " of this exces- 

 sively rare volume with the last sonnet; it being a style 

 in which the Water Poet seldom indulged : — 



" Prince Charles. 

 " Illustrious Offspring of most glorious Stems, 

 Our happy home, our Royall Charles the grfeat, 

 Successive Heyre to foure rich Diadems, 

 With gifts of Grace and Learning high repleat. 

 For thee th' Almighties aid I doe intreat, 

 To guide and prosper thy proceedings still. 

 That long thou maist survive a Prince compleat 

 To guard the good, and to subuert the ill. 

 And when (by God's determin'd boundlesSe will) 

 Thy gratious Father sliall immortal be, 

 Then let thy Fame (like his) the world fulfill, 

 That thou maist ioj- in us, and we in thee. 



And all true Britaines pray to God aboue, 

 To match thy life and fortune with their loue. 

 " FiNis." 



Then follows this important announcement from 

 the pen of Mr. S. Leigh Sotheby, the head of one 

 of the eminent book-auctioneer concerns in the 

 metropolis, and who had conducted the sale : — 



" The extreme rarity of the preceding work has tempted 

 me to insert the notice I have written of it for my Biblio- 

 graphical Account of the Printed Works of the 

 English Poets to the Year 1660, a work to which I 

 have devoted much interest for above Forty Years, be- 



ginning it When I was at scbpol. Having now completed 

 my labours upon the Block Books, except a supplemen- 

 tal volume with more detailed notices of all the copies 

 known on the Continent, it is my intention, should it 

 please the Almighty to spa»e my' life, to fbllow up my 

 early literary pursuit. 



" Such a work would probably extend to twelve volumes 

 demy octavo. There is not the smallest chance of my 

 undertaking the printing of so extensive a work, a work 

 which, no doubt, would, if brought out in volumes, ant- 

 ply remunerate the publishers, I am, however, not so 

 selfish as to wish that so many years' labour and research 

 should be, as it were, locked up in some public library. 

 The work is now in so forward a state, that, in one year 

 from this time, the first or more volumes might be pub- 

 lished. If a few of those booksellers who are interested 

 in the publication of a work of this kind would join td 

 bring it out, remunerating me for my literary labour, at 

 a sum agreed upon per sheet, I should be perfectly willing 

 to undertake it. I feel sure that the Publishers would 

 soon meet their reward, and the Booksellers of the Litera- 

 ture of daj'S past would gain such information, elsewhere 

 not to be found, as would amply rdpay them for placing 

 a copy among their daily books of reference. 



" When I use the words, ' information dsewhere not to 

 he found,^ I desire not, for a moment, to detract from 

 the value of the Censura Literaria, the Restituta, the 

 British Bibliographer, ih^ Retrospective Review, and lastly, 

 the Bibliographer's manual, — a work Compiled with much 

 industry by W. T. Lowndes, Who was, for above twenty 

 years, one of the cataloguers employed by the housfe of 

 Leigh and Sothebj'. While in the first four works 

 quoted, the contents of some of the rarest volumes of 

 Early English Poetry are most amply described, the last 

 does not profess to give notices of any particular class df 

 Literature in more detail than others, and, consequently, 

 is deficient in the Bibliographical Minutiae desired. 



•' S. Leigh Sotheby." 



JiTotwithstanding the encoutagettient thus held 

 out by Mr. Sotheby to a company of booksellerb 

 to become the publishers of his twelve volume* 

 of bibliography, I have not heard that success has 

 attended his appeal. 



It is earnestly to be hoped that Mr. Leigh 

 Sotheby's project may not fall to the ground. He 

 has, by the research and labour bestowed upon his 

 " Illustrated Work on Block Books," obtained a 

 high reputation ; there can be no doUbt there- 

 fore that his Bibliogi-aphy would be worthy of 

 his name, and the literary world would deeply re- 

 gret that no publisher or publishers, in this age of 

 progress, should be found to undertake so desirable 

 a work. J. M. Gutch. 



Worcester. 



MEWS. 



Not long ago I was asked the derivation of 

 the word mevis. After a little consideration I 

 replied, muture — and farther investigation has 

 convinced me of the correctness of this derivia- 

 tion. Mew (or mewe) was formerly used in the 

 sense of hen-coop, and likewise signified a cage for 

 moulting falcons (see Johnson, Halliwell, &c.) ; 

 whilst to mew, meant to moult. Now in French, 

 mue still means hen-coop, and it was also formerly 



