386 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[ond s. No 46., Nov. 15. '56. 



Poetical Wills. — Amongst some scraps, T find 

 the following will of Mr. Joshua West of the Six 

 Clerks' Office, Chancery Lane, dated Dec. 13, 

 1804: 



" Perhaps I die not worth a groat ! 



But should I die worth something more, 

 Then I give that and my old coat, 

 And all my manuscripts in store, 

 To those who shall the goodness have 



To cause my poor remains to rest 

 Witliin a decent shell and grave — 

 Tliis is tlie will of Joshua West." 



« J. A. Berrj-, 

 John Barnes." 



K. W. Hackw^ood. 



A GentlemarCs Library in the Old Times. — Is 

 not the enclosed interesting as a fair specimen of 

 a gentleman's library about the end of the six- 

 teenth century ? It occurs on the fly-leaf of a 

 fine copy of Cicero, Ascension Press, 1511, first 

 capital illuminated, rubricated throughout : 



" Nomina Libroru Quorundam. 

 Eogeri Roos. 

 Item, a Salluste. 

 Item, a Cicero. 

 Item, a Virgill. 

 Item, a Booke of Alexandere. 

 Nowell's de ReUgione Christian^,. 

 Item, a Greeke grammer. 

 Item, a Greeke Xenophon, 

 Item, a Mantuan. 



Item, a book of divinity betwixt Barnes and Standishe. 

 Item, a booke of Erasmus called Copia Verborum. 

 Item, a logike booke, Dialectica Johannis Cassarii. 

 Item, the Booke of Erasmus, entituled Erasmus ad Sa- 



pidum. 

 Item, a Booke of Horace, as Maacenas Atavis sedita re- 



gihus. 

 Item, an English booke called the History of Cleominus 



and Juliet. 



Finis per me Rogeru Roes." 



J. C. J. 



Hackney. 



The Charter Oak of Connecticut (2"'» S. ii. 226.) 

 — It may gratify your correspondent T. to be 

 informed, that the glorious old Charter Oak still 

 lives and flourishes in a cutting from the parent 

 stock. W. W. 



Malta. 



South Sea Schemes. — 



" Of the more than two hundred projects, four only 

 have survived ; and these still exist in full vigour, be- 

 cause founded on good sense and honest principles : the 

 Royal Exchange Assurance Company, the Loudon As- 

 surance Company, the York Buildings Company, and the 

 English Copper Company." — Quarterly Review. 



Abhba. 



Sutile Pictures. — This was the name given by 

 Samuel Johnson to the needlework designs of 

 Mrs. Knowles. I have often been amused with 

 the manner in which the adjective is, almost in- 

 variably, quoted as futile. But, on accidentally 



looking at the letters published by Mrs. Piozzi 

 (17S8,_ vol. i. p. 326.), I find that she herself, or 

 her printer, is to blame for the mistake. M. 



<BL\xtxizi» 



biblical epitomes. 



I possess a Latin Vulgate of the sixteenth 

 century, on the lower margin of which there is, 

 neatly written, in Latin elegiacs, a continuous 

 abstract of the contents of every chapter of the 

 Pentateuch, of the historical Books of the Old 

 Testament, of Isaiah, and of Jeremiah down to 

 the 26th chapter, where It ends abruptly. There 

 are altogether about 2000 lines, four being gene- 

 rally applied to the explanation of each chapter. 

 I transcribe the lines written under the 1st chapter 

 of Genesis : 



" Condidit e nihilo Dominus mare, sidera, terram : 

 Et certis fecit legibus ire vices. 

 Hinc hominem formans, illi benedicit : et hujus 

 Imperium pariter cuncta timere jubet." 



Perhaps some correspondent of " N. & Q." may 

 be able from this specimen to tell me, whether 

 the whole manuscript Is a copy of some popular 

 printed aid to the memory of the biblical student, 

 like the memorial hexameters (prefixed to early 

 editions of the Vulgate), giving a single catch- 

 word only for every chapter of the whole Bible, 

 e.g. Gen. i. : 



12 3 4 5 6 7 



" Sex, prohibet, peccat, Abel, Enoch, et Archa fit, intrat :'Jj 

 or like the Recapitulatio utriusque Testamenti of 

 Petrus de Riga, in the twelfth century, from the 

 first chapter of which he excludes the letter A, 

 from the second B, and so on through the whole 

 alphabet. In English, we have Henoch Clapham's 

 Brief of the Bible's Historie, William AInsworth's 

 (of Chester) Medulla Bibliotnim, and, it may be, 

 many others. Indeed, an interesting Note might 

 be written upon these metrical assistances to the 

 study of the Scriptures. Philobiblus. 



SISTER OF THOMAS A BECKET. 



Is it known that Thomas a Becket had a sister 

 who, after his murder, was pensioned by the 

 crown ? * On searching the early Pipe Rolls for 

 Kent, the following entries (in the Corpus Corni- 

 tutus) of payments by the sheriff attracted my 

 notice, as containing new and interesting inform- 

 ation. 



20 H. 2. 1174. « Et Roheisie sorori S' Thome, xxxiij'." 



21 H. 2. 1175. "Et Roheisie sorori S' Thome, vj» xiij» 



iiij'i." 



22 H. 2. 1176. " Et Roheisie sorori S' Thome, xi" de ele- 



* For particulars of his sister Mari/, see "N. & Q." 1"' 

 S. X. 486. 



