202 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 174. 



Epitaph from Tichfield. — The curious epitaph 

 which I inclose was copied, as closely as possible, 

 from a monument in Tichfield Church, Hants. 

 You may perhaps think it worthy of a place in 

 " N. & Q." 



" The Hvsband, speakinge trewly of his Wife, 

 Read his losse in hir death, hir praise in life. 



Heare Lucie Quinsie Bromfield buried lies, 



With neighbours sad deepe weepinge, hartes, sighes, 



eyes. 

 Children eleaven, tenne livinge me she brought. 

 More kind, trewe, chaste was noane, in deed, word, 



thought. 

 Howse, children, state, by hir was ruld, bred, thrives. 

 One of the best of maides, of women, wives. 

 Now gone to God, her heart sent long before ; 

 In fasting, prayer, faith, hope, and alms' deedes stoare. 

 If anie faulte, she loved me too much. 

 Ah, pardon that, for ther are too fewe such ! 

 Then, reader, if thou not hard-hearted bee, 

 Praise God for hir, but sighe and praie for mee. 



Here by hir dead, I dead desire to lie, 

 Till, rais'd to life, wee meet no more to die. 

 1618." 



EUBI. 



" A horse ! a horse! my kingdom for a horse!''' 

 Richard III., Act V. Sc. 4. — In the edition of 

 the Walewein published by Professor Jonckbloet, 

 Leyden, 1846, is found, vol. ii. p. 178., a remark- 

 able parallel passage to the world-famed line of 

 Shakspeare, the vei'ses 16007-8 of the Lancelot, a 

 romance of the Middle Ages : 



" Addic wapine ende een pard, 

 In gaeft niet om een conincrike." 



" Had I weapons and a horse, 

 I would not give them for a kingdom."' 



From the Navorsclier. 



J. M. 



Weight of American Revolutionari/ Officers. — 

 On the 10th of August, 1778, the American offi- 

 cers at West Point were weighed, with the fol- 

 lowing result : 



Lbs. 

 Col. Michael Jackson 252 

 Col. Henry Jackson - 238 

 Lt.-Col. Huntingdon 212 

 Lieut.-Col. Cobb - 182 

 Lt.-CoL; Humphreys 221 



Only three of the eleven weighed less than two 

 hundred pounds, — a result which does not confirm 

 tie Abbe Raynal's theory of the deterioration of 

 mankind in America. Unbda. 



Philadelphia. 



The Patronymic "Mac." — The Inverness 

 Courier of 1823 gives a list of genuine Celtic sur- 

 names beginning with Mac, amounting to no less 

 than 392. I Kirkwallensis. 



Erroneous Forms of Speech. — Should you con- 

 sider the following as worth a place in your pub- 

 lication, they are at your service. 



1. The much-used word Teetotal is wrong: it 

 ought to be written Teatotal. It implies the use 

 of tea, instead of intoxicating liquors : that was its 

 original meaning. Let us retui'n to the proper 

 spelling. Better late than never. 



2. The expression, lately become very common, 

 " Up to the present time," and so forth, is wrong. 

 It ought to be " Down to the present time." The 

 stream of time, like all other streams, is always 

 descending. In tracing a thing backwards, from 

 the present time, it is quite right to use the word 

 up. 



3. The words down and up are much misapplied 

 by the inhabitants of the provinces in anothet 

 sense, not knowing, or forgetting that, par excel- 

 lence, London is considered the highest locality: 

 frotn every place, how high soever its position, it 

 is " up to London," and to every such place, it is 

 " down from London." In London itself, St. Paul's 

 Cathedral is considered as the highest or central 

 point; and in every street radiating from that 

 point, it is up when going towards it, and down 

 when going from it. In going from St. Paul's to 

 the Poultry we go dozen Cheapside. 



4. The inhabitants of provincial towns and cities 

 are much in the habit of saying such a person is 

 not " in town " to-day. That is wrong : they ought 

 to say " in the town." The word town is, par ex- 

 cellence, applicable to London alone. 



Robert Smart. 

 Sunderland. 



Hexameters from Udimore Register. — The fol- 

 lowing hexameters are copied, from the fly-leaf of 

 a register-book which dates back to 1500. They 

 were written by a vicar in Elizabeth's reign. The 

 burden of the lament is, that the tithes, now worth 

 about 500/. a-year, had been sold by a " sordid 

 unprophetick priest " for 301. per annum, and that 

 consequently all his successors found themselves 

 " vicars without tithes." The register-book is in 

 the church of Udimore, near Rye, in Sussex : 



" Udimer infelix ! nimis est cui Presbyter unus ; 

 Presbyter infelix ! cui non satis Udimer una ; 

 Impropriator habet Clero quae propria durus, 

 Atque alter Proprios Clerus peregrinus et hospes j 

 Ex decimis decimis fruitur vir lege sacerdos 

 Alter Evangelio reliquis prohibente potitur 

 Eheu ! quam pingui macer est mihi passer in arvo 

 Idem est exitium fidei fideique ministro 

 Ita queritur 

 Step. Parr, Vic." 



J. Mn. 



Dr. Johnson. — The parchment containing the 

 grant of the freedom of the city of Aberdeen to the 

 " Literary Colossus," in 1773, once the property of 



