434 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 183. 



absui-d system ^fos carried out ; for two years 

 afterwards we find that another proclamation was 

 published by the King, notifying, " that the prac- 

 tice of making saltpetre in England by digging up 

 the floors of dwelling-houses, &c. &c., tended too 

 much to the grievance of his loving subjects . . . 

 that notwithstanding all the trouble, not one third 



Jart of the saltpetre required could be furnished." 

 t proceeds to state that Sir John Brooke and 

 Thomas Russell, Esq., had proposed a new method 

 of manufacturing the article, and that an exclu- 

 sive patent had been granted to them. The King 

 then commands his subjects in London and West- 

 minster, that after notice given, they " carefully 

 keep in proper vessels all human urine throughout 

 the year, and as much of that of beasts as can be 

 saved." This appeared to fail ; for at the end of 

 the same year, the " stable" monarch proclaimed 

 a return to the old method, giving a commission 

 to the Duke of Buckingham, and some others, to 

 " . . . . break open .... and work for salt- 

 petre," as might be found requisite ; and in 1634, 

 a further proclamation was issued renewing the 

 old ones, but excepting the houses, stables, &c. of 

 persons of qunlity. 



During the Commonwealth the nuisance was 

 finally got rid of; for an act was passed in 1656, 

 directing that " none shall dig within the houses, 

 &c. of any person without their leave first ohtained." 



Broctuna, 

 Bury, Lancashire. 



J. O. treats The Lord Coke, his Speech and 

 Charge, with a Discoverie of the Abuses and Cor- 

 ruptions of Officers, 8vo. London : ISI". Butter, 

 1607, as a genuine document; but it is not so; 

 and, lest the error should gain ground, the follow- 

 ing account of the book, from the Preface, by 

 Lord Coke, to the seventh part of his Reports, is 

 subjoined : 



" And little do I esteem an'uncharltable and mali- 

 cious practice in publishing of an erroneous and ill- 

 spelled pamphlet under the name Pricket, and dedi- 

 cating it to my singular good lord and father-in-law, 

 the Earl of Exeter, as a charge given at the assizes 

 holdeii at the city of Norwich, 4th August, 1605, which 

 I protest was not only published without my privity, 

 but (besides the omission of divers principal matters) 

 that there is no one period therein expressed in that 

 sort and sense that I delivered : wherein it is worthy 

 of observation, how their expectation (of scandalizing 

 me) was wholly deceived ; for behold the catastrophe ! 

 Such of the readers as were learned in the laws, finding 

 not only gross errors and absurdities on law, but pal- 

 pable mistakings in the very words of art, and the 

 whole context of that rude and ragged style wholly dis- 

 sonant (the subject being legal) from a lawyer's dialect, 

 concluded that inimicus et iniquus homo superseminavit 

 zizania in medio tritici, the other discreet and indifTe- 

 rent readers, out of sense and reason, found out the same 

 conclusion, both in respect of the vanity of the phrase, 



and for that I, publishing about the same time one of 

 my commentaries, would, if I had intended the pub- 

 lication of any such matter, have done it myself, and 

 not to have suffered any of my works pass under the 

 name of Pricket ; and so una. voce conclamaverunt omnes, 

 that it was a shameful and shameless practice, and the 

 author thereof to be a wicked and malicious falsary.** 



J. (J. 



Exon. 



WHITE BOSES. 



(Vol. vii., p. 329.) 



The allusion is to the well-known Jacobite 

 badge of the white rose, which was regularly worn 

 on June 10, the anniversary of the Old Pretender's 

 birthday, by his adherents. Fielding refers to the 

 custom in his Amelia : 



" On the lovely 10th of June, under a serene sky, 

 the amorous Jacobite, kissing the odoriferous Zephyr's 

 breath, gathers a nosegay of white roses to deck the 

 whiter breast of Celia." — Amelia, edit. 1752, vol. i. 

 p. 48. 



The following lines are extracted from a col- 

 lection of considerable merit, now become un- 

 common, the authors of the different papers in 

 which were Dr. Deacon and Dr. Byrom, and which 

 is entitled Manchester Vindicated (Chester, 1749, 

 12mo.). The occasion was on a soldier snatching 

 a white rose from the bosom of a young lady on 

 June 10, 1747 : 



I. 



" Phillis to deck her snowy breast 



The rival-flowers around display 'd, 

 Thraso, to grace his war-like crest 

 Of orange-knots a huge cockade, 

 That reds and whites, and nothing else, 

 Should set the beaux against the belles 1 



II. 

 *' Yet so it was ; for yesterdaj? 



Thraso met Phillis with her posies, 

 And thus began th' ungentle fray, 



' Miss, I must execute those roses.' 

 Then made, but fruitless made, a snatch, 

 Repuls'd with pertinacious scratch. 



III. 

 " Surpriz'd at such a sharp rebuke. 

 He cast about his cautious eyes. 

 Invoking VicVry and the Duke, 



And once again attack'd the prize ; 

 Again is taught to apprehend, 

 How guardian thorns the rose defend. ■' 



IV. 



" Force being twice in vain apply'd. 

 He condescended then to reason ; 



* Ye Jacobitish ,' he cry'd J 



' In open street, the love of treason ^ 



With your white roses to proclaim ! 

 Go home, ye rebel slut, for shame I* 



