322 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[Oct. 27. 3855. 



Syr Kryglit ye have a falle, 

 And I the Robyn qwyte shall — 

 Owte on the 1 blewe my home, 

 Hitt ware better be unborne — 

 Let us fight at ottrance, 

 He that fleth God gyfe hym myschaunce — 

 Now I have the maj'stry here, 

 Off I smy te this sory swyre — 

 This knygthys clotiiis wolle I were, 

 . And oijlpiy hede his hede will bere — 

 Well mete" folowe m^-n, 

 What herst y" of gode Robyn — 

 Robj-n Hode and his menye, 

 W' the Sherytfe takyn be' — 

 Sette on foote w' gode wyll. 

 And the Sheryffe wuU we kyll. 

 Beholde weleFrere Tuke, 

 Howe he dotlie his bowe pluke — 

 Zeld yow, Syrs, to the Sheryffe, 

 Or elles shall ye blowes elyff'e — 

 Now we be bownden alle in same, 

 Frere Tuke yis is no game — 

 Come y" forth, y" fals outlawe, 

 Y" shall be hangyde and y drawe — 

 Now, alias! what shall we doo. 

 We moste to the prysone goo — 

 Opy the yatn faste anon, 

 And theif thouys yune gon.' " 



I have transcribed these lines as accurately as 

 I could ; but there are a few words not so plain as 

 I could wish. 



In this curious little volume are also inter- 

 spersed notices relative to Robin Hood, appended 

 to several of the ballads, many of which are new 

 to rae, such as the following : 



" Their frantyke foly is so pevishe, 

 That they contempne in Englyshe 



To have the New Testament ; 

 But as for tales of Robyn Hode, 

 With wother jestes, neither honest nor goode, 

 They have aione impediment." 

 In a libel against Card. Wolsej^, writ by Thos. Seel ton. 

 Poet Laur., printed in old German character in 

 H. YHI. time. 



Opposite to the garland of Robin Hood rescuing 

 Will. Stutely, the doctor has written the following 

 origin of his name, in which he appears to be trac- 

 ing his own : 



" Stutly was of an ancient family from a town of the 

 same name near Huntingdon, related to the Earls of 

 Huntingdon, and therefore to Robin Hood, more properly 

 Stukely, originally Sty vele ; thus Hercules' Point, a pro- 

 montary in Cornwall, is con-upted into Hertleypoint. It 

 seems as if the oath common in Lincolnshire, God's Hart- 

 lings, should be God's Hercules." 



Mr. Fleming St. John has favoured me with 

 the perusal of one of his valuable collection of 

 manuscripts lettered " Stanleiana." It contains 

 numerous original drawings by the doctor for his 

 History of Stonehenge and Abwy, his liinerarium 

 Curiosum, and several for a History of the Celts, 

 some of which were engraved ; and Mr. Nichols 

 states, in his Literary Anecdotes, vol. v. p. 509., 

 that he possessed some of the drawings of Druids 



No. 313.] 



and Druidical remains intended probably for this 

 work. The doctor did not live to publish it. 



From what I have seen of the doctor's manu- 

 scripts, drawings and books in Mr. St. John's pos- 

 session, an antiquary might glean matter for a 

 very entertaining volume, illustrated by many 

 sketches by the doctor, the originals of which, 

 probably, are extinct. J. M. G. 



Worcester. 



The Little Plague of 1658 (Vol. xii., p. 281.).— 

 In the lines from Aldenham parish register, 1665, 

 it is said, — 



" Seaven yeares sence, a lettell plaug God sent." 

 Dr. Black, in his work on Mortality (1788), says : 



" In 1GG5, which is the most furious pestilence in the 

 London annals, the deaths (from plague) amounted to 

 100,000 ; but in the eight preceding years to only 113." 



The "lettell plaug" of 1658 cannot, therefore, 

 have been the plague. 



Dr. Theophilus Thompson, in his Annals of In- 

 fluenza, published by the Sydenham Society, gives 

 at length (p. 11.) the description by Dr. Willis 

 (Practice of Physic, London, 1684) of a severe 

 epidemic of influenza occurring in England in 

 1658 : 



" From the ides of December, almost to the visual 

 equinox, the earth was covered with snow, and, the north 

 wind constantly blowing, all things without doors were 

 frozen; also afterwards, from the beginning of the 

 spring almost to the beginning of June, the same wind 

 still blowing, the season was more like winter than spring, 

 unless now and then a hot day came between. About 

 the end of April suddenly a distemper arose, as if sent by 

 some blast of the stars, which laid hold on very many 

 together; that in some towns, in the space of a week, 

 above a thousand people fell sick together. Such as were 

 endued with an infirm body, or men of a declining age, 

 that were taken with this disease, not a few died of it ; 

 but the more strong, and almost all of an healthful con- 

 stitution, recovered." 



This epidemic is undoubtedly the " lettel plaug " 

 referred to. 



Dr. Short, in his Comparative History, &-c, 

 London, 1767, merely says, "In April a most 

 universal cattarrh." F. S. 



Brook Street. 



Coleridge's Lectures on Shakspeare. — I read 

 with great interest the two reports of the long 

 lost lectures as delivered by Coleridge in 1811, 

 and published in your valuable journal. Vol. xii., 

 p. 80. The short-hand notes of them, which Mr. 

 Collier was enabled to give (Vol. x., pp.' 1. 21. 

 57.), only sharpened the literary appetites of 

 Coleridge's admirers for more ; and Mr. William 

 John Fitzpatrick is entitled to their thanks for 

 having discovered such rare and accurate original 



