4Y4 



NOTES AND QUEEIES. 



[No. 185. 



heads of houses, who deputed 6 to examine it : 

 they pick'd several Proposit. w*^** were read. The 

 sentence was in this form : Propositiones &° tan- 

 qua falsas et impias in Chris. Relig. et in Ecc. 

 praecipue Anglicana contumeliosas damnamus, 

 plerasq; insuper haereticas esse decerninius et de- 

 claramus, Si*^. This was first subscribed by all y^ 

 heads of Coll. and then condemn'd unanimously in 

 a full convocation. The Decree is printed, but is 

 too large to send. The Author of y* Booke has 

 sent about a soft vindication of himselfe, that he 

 is unwilling to be accounted a Socinian, &c. If I 

 can gett a sight of it I will send. you the contents. 

 I do not know how far you are in the right about 

 guessing at a Bursar : Tim. seems resolv'd to act 

 according to y" song ; but I to shew good nature 

 even w"^out a tree have promis'd to make him a 

 Dial : and when that's done I will doe y"^ like at 

 Astrop. I am 



Your very humble serv*, 



W.R. 



If you see Coll. Byerly, give my service to him. 



Directed thus : These to George Clark, Esq., 

 Secretary of War in Ireland. 

 • By y^ way of London. 



Indorsed : W. Rooke, Rec*^ at Tipperary, Sept. 7th. 



A SHAKSPERIAN BOOK. 



" There exists," says Mr. John Wilson, " as it 

 were a talismanic influence in regard to the most 

 trivial circumstance connected with Shakspeare," 

 and yet this enthusiast has not, in his Shaksperiana, 

 alluded to the dramatic works of Mary Hornby, 

 written under, and dated from, the dear old roof 

 at Stratford-upon-Avon ! 



It was my late good fortune, after filling my 

 pockets from the twoi>enny boxes of the suburban 

 bookstalls, to find, on turning out the heterogeneous 

 contents, that I had accidentally become possessed 

 of The Broken Vow, a comedy by the aforesaid 

 lady, who waits to be enrolled in that much 

 wanted book, a new edition of the BiograpJiia 

 Dramatica. Tiiis Broken Vow, which looks like a 

 re-cooking of the Merry Miller of Thomas Sadler, 

 1766, bears to be "printed at Stratford-upon- 

 Avon, for the Author, by W. Barnacle, 1820." 

 Mary Hornby, following the example of the pre- 

 occupier of the bvicher's shop, tries her hand at 

 both tragedy and comedy ; in the first line she 

 stands charged with the perpetration of The Battle 

 of Waterloo, which, I doubt not, rivalled its 

 original enactment in its sanguinary character. I 

 have not been lucky enough to fall in with this, 

 which was a hit; our fair authoress, in her preface 

 to the comedy under notice, modestly attributing 

 its great success more to the kindness of her 

 friends than to its literary merit. 



Mrs. Hornbyf sustains the dignity of the dramai 

 by adhering to her five acts, with prologue and 

 epilogue according to prescription. Looking tO' 

 the prologue for the ivho, the why, and the where- 

 fore, I am sorry to say I find no materials for 

 the concoction of a biographical note ; upon th& 

 second point, the why, she tells us : 



" When women teem, be it with bad or good, 

 They must bring forth — forsooth 'tis right they 



should, 

 But to produce a bantling of the brain, 

 Hard is the task, and oft the labour vain." 



That her literary accouchement should not be a. 

 failure, she further says : 



" Lord, how I've bother'd all the gods and graces, 

 Who patronize some mortals, in such cases." 



I take the expressive use of the word "some" here 

 to indicate her predecessor, the ancient occupier of 

 the tenement, who certainly was a protege of the 

 said parties. 



Mrs. Hornby then goes on to relate how that- 

 during her gestation she invoked Apollo, Thalia^ 

 and Erato : 



" Soon they arrived, with Hermes at their side, 

 By Jove commission'd, as their friend and guide. 

 But when the mirth-inspiring dames stepji'd o'er 

 The sacred threshold oi great Shakspeare' s door. 

 The heav'nly guests, who came to lavgh with me, 

 Oppress'd with grief, wept with Melpomene ; 

 Bow'd pensive o'er the Bard of Nature's tomb, 

 Dropt a sad tear, then left me to my doom ! " 



I leave the reader to judge for himself whether 

 the Muses really " came to laugh " with Mary- 

 Hornby, or whether, under the belief of the im- 

 mortality of our Bard, they did not rather expect 

 a pleasant soiree with Gentle Will, and naturally 

 enough went oiF in a huff when they found them- 

 selves inveigled into a tea-party at Mrs. Hornby's. 

 Mr. Wilson, in the work above quoted, doe& 

 condescend to notice Mrs. Hornby, — 



" Who rented the butcher's shop under the chamber 

 in which the poet was born, and kept the Shaksperiam- 

 Album, an interesting record of the visitors to that 

 shrine. Some of the subscribers having given vent to 

 original stanzas suggested by the scene, those effu- 

 sions," continues the lofty bookseller, " the female in 

 question caused to be inscribed and printed in a small 

 pamphlet, which she sells to strangers." 



Not a word, you will see, about the poet's mantle- 

 having descended upon the shoulders of our Mary, 

 — which was unpolite of him, seeing that both the 

 tragedy and comedy had the precedence of his- 

 book by some years. Not having before me the 

 later history of Shakspeare's house, I am unable 

 to say whether our subject deserved more consi- 

 deration and gallant treatment at the hands of 

 Mr. Colliek, when he and his colleagues came 

 into possession. ' J- O* 



