322 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 287. 



they are quite as authentic, and a trifle more 

 amusing than the rest of the code : 



" No one shall read Common Prayer, keep Christmas 

 or saints' days, make minced pies, dance, play cai-ds, or 

 play on any instruments of music; except the drum, 

 trumpet, and jews'-harp. 



" Every male shall have his hair cut roimd, according 

 to a cap." 



J. H. T. 



State Library, Hartford, Conn. 



Minat ^attS, 



The " Public Ledger." — The inclosed cutting 

 from The Publisher s Circular of March 15, 1855, 

 may interest some of your readers, and seems 

 worth " making a note of : " 



" That the Public Ledger, with a daily circulation of 

 115, should continue to be published, may astonish many 

 of our readers. 



" Established nearly a century ago (in 1758), it fostered, 

 as contributors, Goldsmith and others, M'ho are now 

 classic authors. At this time it was the ' leading journal.' 

 Gradually it glided down into decrepitude. Several 

 efforts were made to restore it, but all have failed. Its 

 115 copies never travel out of 'the city,' but are filed at 

 Lloyd's, at Garraway's, at the North and South American 

 Coffee-house, and a few other places. It lives on its 

 retinency of advertisements, which are ' the last to come 

 to a paper, and the last to leave it.' There is a descrip- 

 tion of auctions in London, called ' Sales by Inch of 

 Candle ' (at which the auctioneer lights an inch of wax 

 taper, and the last bid, before the flame expires, takes 

 the lot), and from time immemorial these have been ad- 

 vertised in the Public Ledger. They include hides and 

 leather, wines and spirits, tallow and timber, drugs and 

 groceries, foreign fruits and preserves, and the public are 

 supposed to look for and at them in the Ledger. There 

 are scores of editors, contributors, reviewers, and reporters 

 connected with the London press, who have never set eyes 

 upon even a stray copy of the Public Ledger, Yet it has 

 a sort of vitality : at least, the profits amount to about 

 800/. a year." 



"William Frasek, B.C.L. 



Alton, Staffordshire. 



William Falcone?; Author of " The Shipjvreck." 

 — The following is inscribed on the slab of a plain 

 altar-tomb which is in the burial-ground on the 

 N. side of Weston Church near Bath, and will 

 probably be interesting to many of your readers : 



" In memory 



Of IMrs. Jane Falconer, 



Kelict of Mr. William Falconer, 



Who was unfortunately lost 



On board the Arrora. 



She departed this life 



March 20th, 1796, 



Aged 61." 



R. W. F. 

 Bath. 



Dodsleys Old Plays. — The following biblio- 

 graphical note, by the famous Malone, will not 

 perhaps be uninteresting. I transcribe it from a 



larjje paper copy of Dodsley's Select Collection of 

 Old Plays, in 12 vols. 8vo. (London, 1780). The 

 notes are in Malone's autography : 



" This elegant set of Old Plays was given me by the 

 editor, Mr. Reed. There were but six sets printed on 

 large paper. — E. Malone." 



" In 1787 eight hundred copies of this edition of Old 

 Plays were burnt in !Mr. Dodsley's warehouse. There 

 were only a thousand printed ; so that the book will pro- 

 bably soon become scarce. — E. M." 



Numerous other notes and corrections, inter- 

 spersed through the work, indicate Malone's 

 acumen and careful perusal. A very few of them 

 are annexed : 



In vol. i. p. XX. of the Preface, the authors of 

 the notes to the text, signed " S." and " S. P.," are 

 named by Malone ; viz. " Mr. Stevens, the editor 

 of Shakspeare" and " Mr. Samuel Pegge." 



Page li. (Dodsley's Preface), note, after the 

 mention of " ' The Fortune,' between Whitecross 

 Street and Golding Lane, which Blaitland tells 

 us was the first playhouse erected in London," 

 Malone says : 



" For which he gives no authority. The paragraph la 

 introduced so absurdly, just after the mention of the City 

 Pest-house (Maitland, ii. p. 1370, edit. 1757), that I can't 

 but suspect some paragraph relative to the Curtain Theatre 

 in S/ioreditch (he is there speaking of Shoreditch) has 

 been omitted. After he has mentioned the Pest-house, he 

 immediately, without any introduction, adds : ' The first 

 playhouse (for aught I can learn) that was erected in the 

 neighbourhood of the city of London, was situate between 

 Whitecross Street and Golden Lane, in a place still de- 

 nominated Plaj'house Yard; where, on the nortn side, 

 are still to be seen the ruins of that street." 



The pi-eface abounds in similar corrections, 

 which to transcribe here would perhaps weary the 

 reader. Serviens. 



Random Readings : Grey or Gray ? — Some 

 doubt has existed as to the correct mode of 

 spelling this word. Dr. Johnson, who derives 

 grey from the French gris, and gray from grau, 

 Dan., graau, Dutch, maintains tliat g?-ay is the 

 proper way of writing it ; and Walker holds a 

 similar opinion. The following lines from the 

 Theogony of Hesiod will, perhaps, throw some 

 light on the subject : 



" *dpKVi S' av Ktjtw TpaCai Tent KaKKmaprjovg, 

 'Ek yeveTTj'; rroXia?, ras Sr) VpaCa'S KaKeovcriv 

 'Xdavarol re Beoi, x^-l^"-'- «PX°Mf •'O' ''■' avOpianoi,." — 270-3. 



Thus translated by C. A. Elton : 



" From Ceto, fair of cheek. 

 And Phorcys, came the Graiaj (Gray they were 

 E'en from the natal hour, and hence their name 

 Is known among the deities on high, 

 And man's earth-wandering race)." 



I have been much struck by the similarity of a 

 passage in Seneca (Be Vita beato, chap, xv.) to 

 the words in the " Collect for Peace " in the Book 

 of Common Prayer, " Whose service is perfect 



