Dec, 25. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



607 



the 'hobbelar' of the Irish doctor" — (by the way, 

 is it not rather a " bull," to make the brogue pro- 

 ceed from the heels, even of a hobbelar?) — yet I 

 rthink that A. B. R. would have to search a long 

 while before he found, in the pages of Pope, 

 such brogue- inspired rhymes as " rake well " and 

 *' sequel," " starve it " and " deserve it," " charge 

 ■ye " and " clergy," and others, such as I quoted at 

 ■p. 431. And it must be remembered that rhymes 

 of this nature are met with, not in isolated passages, 

 but freely scattered over Swift's poems. 



And where is the wonder ? He wrote with 

 great rapidity, and with national enthusiasm, and, 

 when once carried away by his subject, did not 

 pause to blot the rhyme that made music to his 

 Irish ear. 



Perhaps there is no poet, English or Irish, in 

 whom the melody of versification is more strongly 

 marked than in our present laureate, Tennyson ; 

 and, perhaps, in no one of his poems is this melody 

 more beautifully apparent than in the short one 

 of The Dying Swan, which is very music itself. 

 The following lines paint, most perfectly, a fen 

 subject : 



" One willow o'er the river wept, 



And shook the wave as the wind did sigb ; 



Above in the wind was the swallow, 

 Chasing itself at its own wild will. 

 And far thro' the marish green and still ' 

 The tangled water-courses slept, 



Shot over with purple, and green, and yellow." 



It will be observed, that " yellow " is made to 

 Thyme with "swallow;" a rhyme certainly not 

 sanctioned by " pronouncing dictionaries." Now, 

 how was this ? Perhaps all the readers of "N. 

 & Q." may not be aware that, in the eastern 

 counties, " yellow " is, by men of good birth and 

 education, pronounced in a way that to some ears 

 would sound not over-refined, namely, " yallow." 

 Thus, Tennyson, who is a Lincolnshire man, most 

 probably pronounces the word, and hears it so 

 pronounced: and what more natural, therefore, 

 than for a Lincolnshire poet, in describing a Lin- 

 colnshire scene, to make use of a Lincolnshire 

 rhyme ? Elsewhere (ex. gr. The Lotos-Eaters) he 

 makes "yellow" rhyme in the usual way, Lincoln- 

 shire fens not being in view ; just as Swift, though 

 usually obedient to the laws of " pronouncing dic- 

 tionaries," often throws oflT the yoke, and then, as 

 an Irishman describing Irish scenes, makes use of 

 Irish rhymes. 



When A. B. R. asks me to decide the pronun- 

 ciation, by " English standards," of such Cockney 

 rhymes as " mama " (?•) and " star," surely he is 

 wandering from the subject, and treating my Note 

 on the Irishisms of Swift " hypercritically." 



CUTHBERT BeDB, B.A. 



EIKON BASIUKE. 



(Vol. i., p. 137. ; Vol. vi., pp. 361. 438.) 



I might refer S. S. S., for solution of his Query, 

 to the Gent. Mag. for August, 1823 ; but, in case 

 he may not have that voluminous series at hand, 

 I subjoin the substance of what is there written 

 from my own common-place book. 



The meaning of this enigmatical motto had been 

 inquired in one of the early volumes ; and no 

 answer appearing, the proposer himself, one John 

 Thomas, published an explanation to this effect, — 

 that X was the initial of Charles, and K of Crom- 

 well; and as in the Rebellion King Charles's 

 party broke Cromwell's picture, so Cromwell's 

 party broke King Charles's, which caused the man 

 that drew them both to write that motto under, 

 that they might forbear breaking the pictures ; for 

 pictures did no harm. "King Charles's picture 

 did not hurt the city, neither did Cromwell's." 



This, however ingenious, is sufficiently absurd. 

 Another explanation, by Davies Gilbert, he him- 

 self confesses to be ungrammatical, and conse- 

 quently untenable. " He (the king) had not ia 

 any respect injured the State, either by his hand 

 (j^ xO) X^^p'h or by his head (jh Kamta), Ke^a\-l]." 

 But the real explanation was communicated to 

 him by the Rev. Dr. Cardew of Truro, who re- 

 ferred him to the Misopogon of the Emperor 

 Julian {Opera, vol.i. pp. 357. 360., ed. Spurhemii, 

 Leipzig, 1696) : 



" To X' (4'V'f^f) ovSeif TjSiKTjire r7}v iroXiv ov5e to Kainra' 

 Tt fiiv ecTTiv TOVTo T1JS vfj.eTepas aocpias to Aiviyfia, avv- 

 iivai x«^«'''0''' TvxovT€S S' i)ixeis i^ifyrjTaiv airo tjjs u/xe- 

 T€pas Tro\iws, €5t5ax6riiJ.ev apxas ovofianrtcv fiyai to. 

 ypafxixara, SrjXovv 5' eOeAnv to fiiv XpiaTov to 5e Kuv- 

 (TT^avTiov) {-avTiPov?)." 



The Doctor happily explains it thus : " The 

 literal translation will therefore be, ' Christ has 

 not in anything injtired the state, nor has Con- 

 stantino.' But from the whole context it is evi- 

 dent that by the words Christ and Constantine 

 are meant the ecclesiastical establishment and the 

 regal power ; so that the passage may be freely 

 given in English by our well-known exclamation 

 of ' Church and King for ever.' " E. S. Tatlob. 



Ormesby, St. Margaret, Norfolk. 



ALTERATION IN PBATER-BOOK. 



(Vol. vi., pp. 170, 246. 257. 351.) 



The following Order in Council may be worth 

 preserving in " N. & Q.," not only because it fur- 

 nishes a direct reply to the Query of An Oxford 

 B. C. L. (p. 246.) as to the authority by which 

 our Prayer-Books are now stated in their title- 

 pages to be " according to the use of the United 

 Church of England and Ireland," as w^ell as to 

 that of BalliolejiSis (p. 257.), respecting the 



