2n«i S. VIII. Sept. 24. '39.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



241 



LONDON, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 24. 1859. 



No. 195. — CONTENTS. 



NOTES ! — The Lion in Italy, by Sir G. C. Lewis, 241— Folk Lore : 

 One Magpie ^ Warts — Bees — Cliristmas Eve — Sickening Calte — 

 Rustic Superstition — Saints' Days — Custom at Farn borough — Eng- 

 lisli and Foreign Custom of Eating Goose. 242 — King Julm and the 

 Jews in Canterbury, by John Brent, 243 — County Libraries, by Rev. 

 S. F. Creswell, 244 — Flyleaf Scribblings, 245 — Charter of Alexander 



n., Jb. 



Minor Notes : — Rosenfeldians and Mormonites _ Epigram on Coisar 

 Borgia — Walliing Stewart — Bearded Women, 246. 



QXJERIES : —Biblical Conjecture-Notes : the right Date of the Epistle 

 to the Ilebrews, by I"rancis Barham, 247 — Lady Curloss's Dream, 

 by Lady I3ulwer Lytton, 247. 



Minor Qoeries: — "La Thi^baide: " Remy's "La Pucelle " — Jasper 

 Runic King — Dr. Thomas Brett — Archiepiscopal Mitre — Baron of 

 Beef at Windsor — Shawl, at Leybourn — The Frog a Symbol — 

 Dyche's English Dictionary, by Wm. Purdon — Cran brook Grammar 

 School — Battens — Bell Metal — Norton Family, &c., 248. 



Minor Qokries with Answers: — An Almery — Gog and Magog 



" Horn Childe : Child Horn " — Lobster, a Nickname for Soldier- 

 Heraldic: Arms of Greig — Leslie's Answer to Abp. King, 251. 



REPLIES : — Major Duncanson and the Massacre of Glencoe, by T. 

 Carter, *c., 252 — " Tlie Wren Song," by Sir J. Emerson Tennent, &c. 

 253 — Henry Smitli, by B. H. Cowper, 254. 



Replirs to Minor Queries : — " Life is before ye! " — Eiford — Super- 

 Altars— Vales of Red and White Horse- John Anderson — Marat 

 — Ballop- Scotch Genealogies — Extraordinary Birtli — Liverpool, 

 Cespoole, Lerpoole — The Vulgate of 1 482 — Pill-garUck — Very — 

 " O whar got ye Siat bonnie blue bonnet," &c., 255. 



THE LION IN ITALY. 



The prodigies which immediately preceded the 

 assassination of Julius Caesar are described in the 

 following passages : Suet, Cces. 81. ; Val. Max., 

 i. 6. 13.; ib. 7. 2.; Obsequens, c. 127. (67.); 

 Plut. Cces., 63.; Appian, B.C. ii. 115.; Dio 

 Cass., xliv. 17. Compare Virg. Georg., i. 466. 

 They were: 1. A dream of Csesar himself, that 

 he had been carried up into the clouds, and had 

 taken Jupiter by the right hand. 2. A dream of 

 his wife Calphurnia, that their house had fallen in, 

 and that he had been wounded by assassins, and 

 had taken refuge in her bosom. 3. The arms of 

 Mars, deposited in his house, rattled at night. 4. 

 The doors of the room where he slept flew open 

 spontaneously. 5. The victims and birds were 

 inauspicious. 6. Solitary birds appeared in the 

 forum. 7. There were lights in the sky and noc- 

 turnal noises. 8. Fiery figures of men were seen ; 

 a flame issued from the hand of a soldier's slave 

 without hurting him. 9. After the murder of 

 Caesar, it was remembered that the attendant re- 

 moved his gilded chair from the senate room, 

 thinking that he would not attend the meeting. 



Shakspeare, in the play of Julius Ccesar, intro- 

 duces Casca relating to Cicero the prodigies seen 

 on this occasion. He first describes a violent 

 thunderstorm, and next proceeds thus; — 

 " A common slave (you know him well bj' sight), 

 Held up his left hand, which did flame, and burn 

 Like twenty torches joined ; and yet his hand, 

 Not sensible of fire, remained unscorched. 

 Besides (I have not since put up mj' sword), 

 Against the Capitol J met a lion. 

 Who glared upon me, and went surly by. 

 Without annoying me ; and there were drawn 



Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women, 

 Transformed with their fear, who swore they saw 

 Men, all on fire, walk up and down the streets. 

 And yesterday the bird of night did sit, 

 Even at noonday, upon the market place, 

 . Hooting and shrieking." — Act I. Sc. 3. 



Lower down, in the same scene, Cassias alludes 

 to the prodigy of the lion in the Capitol : — 



" . . . . Now could I, Casca, 

 Name to thee a man most like this dreadful night, 

 That thunders, lightens, opens graves, and roars 

 As doth the lion in the Capitol." 



In a subsequent scene, Calphurnia relates other 

 prodigies to CaDsar : — 



" CaBsar, I never stood on ceremonies, 

 Yet now they fright me. There is one within, 

 Besides the things that we have heard and seen, 

 Recounts most horrid sights seen by the watch. 

 A lioness hath whelped in the streets. 

 And graves have yawned, and yielded up their dead ; 

 Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds 

 In ranks and squadrons and right form of war, 

 Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol. 

 The noise of battle hurtled in the air, 

 Horses did neigh, and d3'ing men did groan, 

 And ghosts did shriek and squeal about the streets." 



Act II. Sc. 2. 

 The prodigies of the lion in the Capitol, and of 

 the lioness whelping in the streets of Rome, do not 

 occur in any ancient writer, and were introduced 

 by Shakspeare himself. Their introduction proves 

 him to have overlooked the fact that the lion was 

 never a native of Italy. 



Lucretius, in a passage of his fifth book, de- 

 scribes the nature of men and animals as showing 

 itself from their birth, and he thus speaks of the 

 young of leopards and lions : — 



"•At catuli pantherarum scj'mnique leonum 

 Unguibus ac pedibus jam turn morsuque repugnant, 

 Vix etiam cum sunt dentes unguesque creati." 



V. 1034-6. 

 It may be doubted whether this statement was 

 founded upon observation, and whether Lucretius 

 ever saw the young of the leopard and the lion. 

 Certainly, the lion's whelps which were exhibi'ted 

 a few years ago in this country appeared tame 

 and good-natured, and quite devoid of the ferocity 

 which is the attribute of the full-grown animal. 



In a subsequent passage of the same book, he 

 speaks of the early generations of mankind as 

 using savage animals for the purposes of war : — 

 " Tentarunt etiam tauros in moenere belli, 

 Expertique sues ssevos sunt mittere in hostes. 

 Et validos partim prae se misere leones, 

 Cum doctoribus armatis saevisque magistris, 

 Qui moderarier his possint vinclisque tenere." 



V. 1306-10. 

 In the following verses (v. 1311-27.) he de- 

 scribes this experiment as unsuccessful, because 

 these animals turned upon their own men, and 

 destroyed them. Lucretius states elsewhere in 

 the same book that his illustrations of primitive 

 society were not derived from any historical re- ' 



