■2n'J S. VIII. Aug. G. '59.] 



NOTES AND. QUERIES. 



107 



lion of Venus, armed with an arrow and a burn- 

 ing heart. On tbe back is a brass plate with the 

 following inscription : — 



" This chair, once the propcrtj' of Alexander Pope, was 

 cjiven as a keepsake to the nurse who attended him in his 

 last illness. From her descendants it was obtained by 

 the Rev. Thomas Ashle}', when curate of the parish of 

 Binfield, and kindly presented by him to Lord Braj-- 

 brooke in 1844, nearly a century after the poet's de- 

 cease." 



J. Yeoweix. 



Illustration of " BoswelVs Johnson." — I am 

 struck with the coincidence between the follow- 

 ing passages. The first occurs in Mr. Boswell's 

 Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides (2nd edit. p. 

 505.): — 



" At Sir Alexander Dick's, from that absence Of mind 

 to which every man is at times subject, I told, in a 

 blundering manner. Lady Eglintoune's complimentary 

 adoption of Dr. Johnson as her son, for I unfortunately 

 stated that her ladyship adopted him as her son, in con- 

 sequence of her having been married the year after he 

 was born. Dr. Johnson instanth' corrected me. . ' Sir, 

 don't you perceive that j-ou are defaming the Countess ? 

 For supposing me to be her son, and that she was not 

 married till the 3'ear after my birth, I must have been 

 her natural son.' A j'oung lady of qualitj', who was pre- 

 sent, very handsomely said, 'Might no't the son have 

 justified the fault?' 'My friend was much flattered by 

 this compliment, which he never forgot. When in more 

 than ordinary spirits, and talking of his journey in Scot- 

 land, he has called to me, ' Boswell, what was it that the 

 young lady of quality said of me at Sir Alexander 

 Dick's?' Xobody will doubt that I was happv in re- 

 peating it." 



Now I put in juxta-position with [this the fol- 

 lowing from the first scene in King Lear (slightly 

 abbreviated) : — 



" Kent. Is not this 3'our son, my Lord? 



" Gloucester. Sir, this young fellow's mother had in- 

 deed. Sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a husband for 

 her bed. Do 3'ou smell her fault ? 



" Kent. I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it 

 being so proper." 



Might not the young lady of quality have bor- 

 rowed the compliment from this passage ? G. J. 



Sir Walter Raleigh. — Whilst searching amongst 

 some MSS. in the State Paper Office, I found the 

 following document relating to Sir Walter Raleigh, 

 which perhaps may be interesting to some of your 

 historical readers. It is dated 1606, and was pro- 

 bably written during the month of March. It 

 throws some light on the sufferings Sir Walter 

 underwent during his imprisonment in the Tower. 



" Sir Water Ealeghs complayning is in this manner. 

 All his left sj'de is extreme cold out of sense or motion 

 or num. His fingers on the same syde begining to be 

 contracted and his tong taken in sum parte in so mj'che 

 that he speketh wekely and it is to be fered he may ut- 

 terly lose the use of it. 



" peter Turner, D. of Phisick. 



" in respect of these circumstances to speke lyke a 

 phisition it were good for him if it might stand with 

 your Honores lyking that he were removed from the cold 



lodging where he lyeth unto a warmer that is to say a 

 little room w"''* he hath bilt in the garden adjoining to 

 his stilhouse." 



W. 0. w. 



Scarborough. 



Preservation of Monumental Brasses. — At one 

 of the late meetings of the Society of Antiquaries, 

 it was stated that these noble and interesting ob- 

 jects are still frequently disappearing. The faci- 

 lities afforded by the marine store shops, and 

 ignorance of their value in other respects, are the 

 chief causes. Would it not assist their preser- 

 vation if a complete list were made and printed 

 in the form of a Handbook, so that every traveller 

 might know what brasses there were in each 

 church, and inquire for them accordingly ? The 

 fact of this species of registration, and the chance 

 of their being often asked after, would operate as 

 a great check against their being removed. A. A. 

 Poets' Corner. 



Smoking Anecdote. — Probably this anecdote 

 may be acceptable to Mr. Andrew Steinmetz 

 and other smokers, if they do not already possess 

 it. I take it from vol. iii., French Anas, Chev- 

 rceana, p. 51.: — 



" A gentleman told me, who had studied under (Pro- 

 fessor) Baxhorne (he succeeded Heinsius as Professor of 

 Politics and History at Leyden in 1633. His works are 

 learned and numerous) at Leyden, that this learned pro- 

 fessor was equally indefatigable in reading and smoking. 



" To render these two favourite amusements compatible 

 with each other, he pierced a hole through the broad 

 brim of his hat, through which his pipe was convej-ed 

 when he had lighted it. In this manner he read and 

 smoked at the same time. When the bowl of the pipe 

 was empty, he filled it, and repassed it through the same 

 hole ; and so kept both his hands at leisure for other em- 

 ployments. At other times he was never without a pipe 

 in his mouth." 



Being a smoker, I conceive the above may 

 prove interesting as a note to Mr. Steinmetz's 

 valuable little work on Tobacco. 



How old was the bishop when he died ? 

 T. C. Anderson, 

 H.M.'s 12th Regt. Bengal Army. 

 8. Warwick Villas, Maida Hill, W. 



Handel's Hallelujah Chorus. — The following 

 cutting from a recent newspaper deserves perhaps 

 a place in " N. & Q." : — 



"The Origin of Standing at Handel's Halle- 

 LULAH Chorus. — From an anecdote in the Biographia 

 Dramatica, we discover the origin of the custom of the 

 audience standing during the performance of the Halle- 

 lujah Chorus. VVhen this piece was first performed, the 

 audience were exceedingly struck and affected by the 

 music in general, but when the chorus reached the pas- 

 sage, ' For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth,' they were 

 so transported that they all, with the King, who was 

 present, started up and remained standing till the chorus 

 was concluded : and hence it became the practice in Eng- 

 land for the audience to stand while that part of the music 

 is performing." 



Abhba. 



