476 



NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



[No. 185. 



the melancholy of their condition, was sometimes en- 

 joined by his master to write occasional verses ; one of 

 which amusements was probably his ode or song upon 

 the Embassy to Poland, by whicli he and Lord Crofts 

 procured a contribution of ten thousand pounds from 

 the Scotch, that wandered over that kingdom. Poland 

 was at that time very much frequented by itinerant 

 traders, who, in a country of very little commerce and 

 of great extent, where every man resided on his own 

 estate, contributed very much to the accommodation of 

 life, by bringing to every man's house those little neces- 

 saries which it was very inconvenient to want, and very 

 troublesome to fetch. I have formerly read, without 

 much reflection, of the multitude of Scotchmen that 

 travelled with their wares in Poland ; and that their 

 numbers were not small, the success of this negociation 

 gives sufficient evidence." 



The title of Denham's poem is " On my Lord 

 Crofts' and my journey into Poland, from whence 

 we brought 10,000/. for his Majesty by the deci- 

 mation of his Scottish subjects there." 



Peter Cunningham. 



BISHOP JUXON AND WALTON S POLTGLOTT BIBLE. 



In the library at this island, which formerly be- 

 longed to the Knights of Malta, there is an edition 

 of Walton's Polyglott Bible, which was published 

 in London in 1657. This work is in a most per- 

 fect state of preservation. 



On the title-page of the first of the eleven 

 volumes, there is written, in a bold and perfectly 

 legible manner, the .following words : 



" Liber Coll. Di Joannis Bapt" Oxon Ex dono Re- 

 verendiss. in Xt"> Patris Gvil' Jvxon Archiep. Can- 

 tvariensis. A° D"' 166.3." 



Just below, but on the right of the above, there is 

 written in a clear hand as follows : 



" Ex Libris domus Abbatialis S. Antonij Viennensis, 

 Catalogo Inscript an. 1740. No. 11." 



That the question which I shall ask at the end 

 of this Note may be the more easily answered, it 

 will perhaps be necessary for me to state, that in 

 the year 1777, Rohan, the Grand Master of the 

 Knights of Malta, succeeded in annexing the pro- 

 perty belonging to the Order of St. Antonio de 

 Vienna to that of Malta. In accepting of these 

 estates, which were situated in France and Savoy, 

 Kohan bound himself to pay the many mortgages 

 and debts with which they were encumbered ; 

 and so large an amount had to be thus defrayed, 

 that for a hundred years the convent would not 

 be reimbursed for its advances, and receive the 

 120,000 livres, at which sum their annual rental 

 would then be valued. Of the foundation of this 

 Order a recent writer (Thornton) thus remarks : 



" In 1 095 some nobles of Dauphiny united for the 

 relief of sufferers from a kind of leprosy called St. An- 

 thony's fire, which society, in 1218, was erected into a 



religious body of Hospitallers, having a grand master 

 for chief. This order, after many changes in its con- 

 stitution, having been left the option between extinc- 

 tion and secularisation, or union with another order, 

 accepted the latter alternative, and selected that of St. 

 John of Jerusalem." 



Among the movable effects which came to the 

 Knights of Malta by this arrangement, was a 

 small and well-selected library, and in it this edi- 

 tion of Walton's Bible. 



Without, therefore, writing more at length on 

 this subject, which might take up too much space 

 in " N. & Q.," I would simply add, that my atten- 

 tion was called to this work by the Rev. Mr. 

 Howe, chaplain of H.B.M. ship "Britannia," and 

 for the purpose of asking, At what time, by whom, 

 and in what manner, were these volumes removed 

 from St. John's College at Oxford, and transferred 

 to the library of the Order of St. Antonio de 

 Vienna in France ? W^. W. 



La Valetta, Malta. 



Minat ^ucrteiS. 



Was Andrew Marvell poisoned? — I have just 

 been reading the three ponderous quarto volumes 

 comprising The Works of Andrew Marvell, as col- 

 lected and edited by his townsman, Capt. Edward 

 Thompson of Hull. In the " Life," near the end 

 of vol. iii., we are told that the patriot died on 

 Aug. 16, 1678, " and by poison ; for he was health- 

 ful and vigorous to the moment he was seized 

 with the premeditated ruin." And again, in a 

 summary of his merits, we are told that " all these 

 patriot virtues were insufficient to guard him 

 against the Jesuitical machinations of the state ; 

 for what vice and bribery could not influence, was 

 perpetrated by poison." This heinous crime, so 

 formally averred against the enemies of Marvell, 

 may have been committed by " some person or 

 persons unknown ;" but, as not a tittle of evidence 

 is adduced or indicated by the zealous biographer 

 in support of the charge — Query, had it any 

 foundation in fact ? In the court, and out of the 

 court, the anti-popish, anti-prelatical Puritan had 

 enemies numerous and bitter enough ; but is there 

 really any other ground for the abominable impu- 

 tation of foul play alluded to, beyond his actually 

 sudden death ? Is the hypothesis of poison coeval 

 with the date of Marvell's demise ? If so, was 

 there any official inquiry — any " crowner's quest ? " 

 Surely his admiring compatriots on the banks of 

 the Humber did not at once quietly sit down with 

 the conviction, that thus " fell one of the first 

 characters of this kingdom or of any other." H. 



Anonymous Pamphlet hy Dr. Wallis (Vol. vii., 

 p. 403.).— AVill Mr. Ckossley have the kindness 

 to give the title of the anonymous pamplilet which, 

 he informs us, was published by Dr. John Wallis 



