568 



NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



[No. 189. 



critics, and all the countless throng who are am- 

 bitious to daub witli their un-tempered mortar, or 

 scribble their names upon the most majestic edifice 

 of genius that the world ever saw, lack the little 

 discernment necessary to interpret aright the 

 above extract from Cymbeline, for the last hundred 

 years racked and tortured in vain, let them at 

 length learn henceforth to distrust their judgment 

 altogether. W. R. Arrowsmith. 



P. S. — In article of No. 180. p. 353., a rather 

 important misprint occurs, viz. date of 4to. King 

 JRichard II. with unusual title-page, which should 

 be 1608, not 1605. Other little errors the reader 

 may silently amend for himself. 



VERNEY PAPERS THE fAPUCHIN FRIARS, ETC. 



In the appendix to Notes of Proceedings in the 

 Long Pai'liament, by Sir Ralph Verney, edited by 

 Mr. Bruce for the Camden Society in 1845, are 

 " Notes written in a Cipher," which Mr. Bruce 

 gives in the hope that the ingenuity of some reader 

 will discover their meaning. I venture thus to 

 decypher the same : 



*^ The Capuchins' house to be dissolued. 



No extracts of letters to be aloued in this house. 



The prince is now come to Greenhich three lette. 



Three greate ships staled in France. 



Gersea a letter from Lord S' Albones. 



;£ll per diem Hull. 



Th^ king's answcrt to our petition about the militia. 



If a king offer to kil himselfe, wee must not only 

 advise but wrest the weapon from. 



A similitude of a depilat. 



Consciences corrupted." 



I ought to state that in one or two instances tlie 

 wrong cypher has evidently been used by mistake, 

 and this has of course increased the difficulty of 

 decyphering the notes. 



With reference to the note " The Capuchins' 

 House to be dissolued," may I be allowed to refer 

 to the following votes in the House of Commons, 

 of the date 26th February, 1641-2 : 



« Ordered, That Mr. Peard, Mr. Whistler, Mr. 

 Reynolds, Mr. Prideaux, Mr. Selden, Mr. Young, Mr. 



having been made, it was gravely, almost magisterially 

 proposed by one of the disputants, to corrupt the con- 

 cluding lines (Mr. Colmer having already once before 

 corrupted the preceding ones by substituting a plural 

 for a singular verb, in which lay the true key to the 

 right construction) by altering "their" the pronoun 

 into " there " the adverb, because (shade of Murray !) 

 the commentator could not discover of what noun 

 " their " could possibly be the pronoun in these lines 

 following : 

 " When great things labouring perish in their birth. 



Their form confounded makes most form in mirth." 

 And it was left to Mr. Keightlky to bless the world 

 with the information that it was " things." 



Hill, do presently withdraw, to peruse the statutes now 

 in force against priests and Jesuits. 



" Ordered, That Mr. Whittacre, Mr. Morley, do 

 presently go to Denmarke House, 



" Resolved, That the Capuchines shall be forthwith 

 apprehended and taken into safe custody l)y the Ser- 

 jeant-at-.'irms attending on this house ; and there kept 

 till this house take farther order." 



The Capuchins were under the protection of the 

 Queen Henrietta Maria ; Denmark House was the 

 name by which Somerset House was at the period 

 known. 



Under date 2nd March, 1641-2, are the follow- 

 ing entries in the Commons' Journal : 



" Mr. Holies I)rings this answer from the French 

 Ambassador, That the Capuchins being sent hither by 

 Articles of Treaty between the Two Crowns, he durst 

 not of himself send them without Order from the Kino- 

 his Master, or the King and Queen here: And said 

 farther, That the Queen had left an express Command 

 for their stay here ; and that he would be ever ready 

 to do any good Office for this House, and to keep a 

 good Correspondency between the Two Crowns ; and 

 if this House pleased, he would undertake to keep 

 them safe Prisoners at Somersett House ; and that tlie 

 chapel there shall have the doors locked, and no Mass 

 be said there. 



" Ordered, That Mr. Hollis do acquaint the French 

 Ambassador, that this House doth accept of his Offer 

 in securing the Persons of the Capuchins, till this 

 House take farther Order : and that the Doors be 

 locked, and made fast, at the Chapel at Somersett 

 House ; and that no Mass be said there. 



" Ordered, That the Lord Cramborne and Mr. 

 Hollis shall acquaint the French Ambassador with the 

 desires of this House, that the Capuchins be forthwith 

 sent away ; and to know if he will undertake to send 

 them away; and, if he will, that then they be forthwith 

 delivered unto him. 



" That Mr. Hollis do go up to the Lords, to ac- 

 quaint them with the Resolutions of this House, con- 

 cerning the Capuchins, and desire their Lordships' con- 

 currence therein." 



Some particulars of the proceedings of the par- 

 liament against the Capuchins may be found in 

 " Memoirs of the Mission in England of the Capu- 

 chin Friars of the Province of Paris by Father 

 Cyprian Gamache," in The Court and Times of 

 Charles /., vol. ii. pp. 344. 354. 



Thompson Cooper. 



Cambridge. 



EARLY SATIRICAL POEM. 



On turning over the pages of an old printed 

 copy of Durand's Rationale Divinorum Officioruni^ 

 edited by Bonetus de locatellis bergomensis, and 

 printed at Lyons in 1506, by Natalis Bi-abatn, for 

 Jaques Huguetan, I ibund the following copy of 

 verses Avritten on the fly-leaf. They are written 

 in a hand which I am inclined to assign to a date 



