S68 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 207. 



Can you or any of your readers furnish me witli 

 the title of the book intended, or direct me to any 

 other sources of information on the subject of the 

 Honiton fires ? S. T. 



[Notices of fires at Honiton occur in the following 

 works : — The Wisdom and Riyhteousness of Divine 

 Providence. A sermon preached at Honiton on oc- 

 casion of a dreadful fire, 21st August, 1765, which 

 consumed 140 houses, a chapel, and a meeting-house. 

 By R.Harrison, 4to. 1765. — Shaw, in his To»7- to 

 the West of England, \>.4A'i., mentions a dreadful fire, 

 19th July, 1747, which reduced three parts of the 

 town to ashes. — Lysons' Devonshire, p. 281., states that 

 Honiton has been visited by the destructive calamity 

 of fire in 1672, 1747, 1754, and 1765. The last-men- 

 tioned happened on the 21st August, and was the most 

 calamitous; 115 houses were burnt down, and the 

 steeple of AUhallows Chapel, with the school, were 

 destroyed. The damage was estimated at above 

 10,500/.] 



Michaelmas Goose, — The following little incon- 

 sistency in a commonly-received tradition has led 

 lae, at the request of a large party of well-read 

 and literary friends, to request your solution of 

 the difficulty in an early Number of your paper. 



It is currently reported, and nine men in ten 

 •will tell you, if you ask them the reason why 

 goose is always eaten on the 29th Sept.,'or Michael- 

 mas Day, that Queen Elizabeth was eating goose 

 when the news of the destruction of the Invincible 

 Armada was brought, and she immediately put 

 down her knife and fork, and said, " From this day 

 forth let all British-born subjects eat goose on this 

 d^y." 



Now in Creasy's Battles it is stated that the 

 Spanish fleet was destroyed in the month of July. 

 How could it then be the 29th of Sept. when the 

 Bews of its defeat reached lier majesty ? If any of 

 your readers can solve this seeming improbability 

 he will greatly oblige Michaelmas Dat. 



[Although it may be difficult to show how it is that 

 the custom of eating goose has in this country been 

 transferred to Michaelmas Day, while on the Continent 

 it is observed at Martinmas, from which practice the 

 goose is often called St. Martin's bird, it is very easy to 

 prove that there is no foundation for the tradition 

 referred to by our correspondent. For the following 

 extract from Stow's AnnaJes (ed. Howes), p. 749., will 

 show that, so far from the news of the defeat of the 

 Armada not reaching Elizabeth until the 29th of 

 September, public thanksgivings for the victory had 

 been offered on the 20th of the preceding month : 



"On the 20ih of August, M. Nowell, Deane of 

 Paules, preached at Paules Crosse, in presence of the 

 lord Maior and Aldermen, and the companies in their 

 best liveries, moving them to give laud and praise 

 wnto Almightie God, for the great victorie by him 

 given to our English nation, by the overthrowe of the 

 Spanish fleete,"] 



SRPiJTtf^. 



PORTRAITS OF HOBBES AND LETTERS OF HOLLAR. 



(Vol.viii., p. 221.) 



Although I cannot answer the question of Sir 

 Walter Trevelyan, the following notices re- 

 specting the portraits of the Pliilosopher of 

 Malmesbury may not be unacceptable to him and 

 to those who hold this distinguished man's memory 

 in high respect. 



That admirable gossip, .Tohn Aubrey, who lived 

 in habits of intimacy with Hobbes, has left us such 

 a lively picture of the man, his person, and his 

 manners, as to leave nothing to desire. In reading 

 it we cannot but regret that Aubrey had not been 

 a cotemporary of our great poet, about whom he 

 has been only able to furnish us with some hearsay 

 anecdotes. 



Aubrey tells us that — 



" Sir Charles Scarborough, M. D., Physician to his 

 Royal Highness the Duke of York, much loved the 

 conversation of Hobbes, and hath a picture of him 

 (drawne about 1655), under which is this distich : 



' Si quaeris de me, mores inquire, sed ille 

 Qui quEerit de me, forsitan alter erit.' " 



" In their meeting (/. e. the Royal Society) at Greshara 

 College is his picture drawne by the life, 1663, by a 

 good hand, which they much esteeme, and several 

 copies have been taken of it." 



In a note Aubrey says : 



" He did me the honour to sit for his picture to 

 Jo. Baptist Caspars, an excellent painter, and 'tis a 

 piece. I presented it to the Society twelve years 



In other places he tells us : 



" Amongst other of his acquaintance I must not 

 forget Mr. Samuel Cowper (Cooper), the prince of 

 limners of this last age, who drew his picture as like 

 as art could afford, and one of tlie best pieces that ever 

 he did ; which his Majesty, at his returne, bought of 

 him, and conserves as one of his greatest rarities in his 

 closet at Whitehall." 



In a note he adds : 



" This picture I intend to be borrowed of his Ma- 

 jesty for Mr. Loggan to engrave an accurate piece by, 

 which will sell well both at home and abroad." 



Again he says : 



" Mr. S. Cowper (at whose house Hobbes and Sir 

 William Petty often met) drew his picture tv/ice : the 

 first the King has ; the other is yet in the custody of 

 his (Cooper's) widowe; but he (Cowper) gave it in- 

 deed to me (and I promised I would give it to the 

 archives at Oxon), but I, like a fool, did not take pos- 

 session of it, for something of the garment was not 

 quite finished, and he died, I being then in the 

 country." 



