216 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2'»'J S, VIII. Sept. 10. '59. 



And Cowper thus commences his Fable, "Pair- 

 ing Time anticipated : " — . 



" I shall not ask Jean Jaques Rousseau 

 If birds confabulate or no ; 

 'Tis clear, that they were alwaj's able 

 To hold discourse, at least in fable; 

 And even the child who knows no better 

 Than to interpret, by the letter, 

 A story of a cock and bull. 

 Must have a most uncommon skull." 



The allusion in the first line is, of course, to 

 Rousseau's absurd crotchet, that children ought 

 not to read fables in which " cocks and bulls " are 

 made to speak, lest they should learn deception. 



Qu. How far back does the use of the phrase 

 go? 



I see by the " London Antiquary's " new Dic- 

 tionary of Modern Slang, &c., that the term cocks 

 is applied to the " fictitious narratives, in verse or 

 prose, of murders, fires, and terrible accidents, 

 sold in the streets as true accounts." He adds, 

 "possibly a corruption of cook, a cooked state- 

 ment." I would rather suggest, "a contraction, 

 for cock-and-bull stories." Ache. 



d&t^XitS t0 :^iitnr Cutties. 



Dr. Donne s Seal (2"'' S. viii. 1 70.) — In reply 

 to this Query, I extract the following from a 

 letter I received from Dr. Bliss : — 



" Oct. 1841. 



" I send you an impression from my seal, which 

 is not original, but a fac-simile from an original 

 in the hands of Mr. Domeville Wheeler of Bad- 

 ham. 



"I have seen two undoubted Donne seals ; one 

 in the hands of a boy at school with me forty- 

 five years ago, and of which, boy as I was, I then 

 sent an account to the Gent's Mag. ; and this of 

 Mr. Wheeler's. The former, I fear, is lost. You 

 will see a print of a third in Pickering's ' Life of 

 Walton,' prefixed to his magnificent edition of 

 The Angler. 



" In great haste, truly yours, 



" Philip Bliss." 



From the impression above alluded to, Tassie, 

 of Leicester Square, made me a glass seal, with 

 which I fasten this letter. No doubt he has the 

 matrix of that; and Mr. Smith, of 42, Eathbone 

 Place, has cut a die for envelope seals. 



On receipt of postage stamps, I shall be happy 

 to send an impression to any readers of " N. & 

 Q." H. T. Ellacombe. 



Rectory, Clyst St. George. 



Ralph Bokehy, Sfc. (2"* S. viii. 89.) — Mr. In- 

 GLEDEw will find ample information on the points 

 about which he inquires in Burke's Extinct Ba- 

 ronetage. Ralph Rokeby of Mortham and Rokeby 

 married Margery, eldest daughter and coheir of 



Robert Danby of Yafibrd, by a daughter of Sir 

 Richard Conyers, Knight. Her will and the in- 

 ventory of her eldest son Thomas Rokeby are to 

 be found in vol. xxvi. of the Surtees Society's 

 publications. The present representative of the 

 family is the Rev. H.R. Rokeby, rector of Arthing- 

 worth, Northants. C. J. Robinson. 



Sevenoaks, Kent. 



Ci-omweWs Knights (2°* S. viii. 31.) — Thomas 

 Dickeson, mentioned in the list given by L. H., 

 appears to be the same with Thomas Dickinson, 

 merchant of York, who was twice Lord Mayor, 

 and also represented the city in parliament. He 

 is described as " a mighty man against his royal 

 master." — Vide Fabric Rolls of York Minster, p. 

 331. n. E. H. A. 



Ring Posies (2°'^ S. vii. 251.) — The following 

 are given from wills of the seventeenth century in 

 the glossary appended to Fabric Rolls of York Min- 

 ster, recently edited for the Surtees Society by 

 the Rev. James Raine, p. 350.^ — 



" Nosce teipsum." 



" Think on mee." 



" Desire and deserve." 



" Keepe faith till death." 



" As God hath appointed." 



" Soe I am contented." 



E. H. A. 

 John de Witt (2°* S. i. 98.) —I have in my pos- 

 session an autograph of John de Witt's appended 

 to an official letter, and having recently seen some 

 queries in th» first volume of the present series 

 relating to the proper way of spelling his name, 

 perhaps I may be excused for again noticing this 

 subject. 



I believe autographs of John de Witt are not 

 often met witli. Me. Hendricks states (2"* S. i. 

 98.) that he has only seen one, although he subse- 

 quently came across a lithographed letter : in both, 

 however, the name was spelt differently, — in the 

 Latin with one t, in the Dutch with two. The evi- 

 dence being thus equally balanced, I take the 

 liberty of coming forward, and claiming a verdict 

 for the double t, it being so spelt in my letter; 

 thus — " Johan de Witt, 1657." 



This letter is written in Dutch, on folio paper, 

 and contains about twenty-two lines very closely 

 written ; and, being in Dutch, I am desirous of 

 having it translated. Will any lover of these 

 matters, through the medium of "N. & Q.," kindly 

 undertake it for me ? W. O. W. 



Scarborough. 



Ballad: Elland or Eland (2'>'» S. viii. 169.) — 

 In reply to your correspondent's inquiry, I beg to 

 refer him to the 5th vol. of Allen's Histo7-y of the 

 County of York, p. 398. to 400., where he will find 

 a narrative of this feud between the Elands and 

 the Beaumonts. John Nurse Chad wick. 



King's Lynn. 



