480 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 295. 



all the promised land, reduced a province under 

 Koman yoke, oieys Tiberius." Here the reader 

 has a baker's dozen of examples from Milton of 

 that construction which the Aristarchuses of the 

 House of Commons decide to be a " flagrant vio- 

 lation of grammar." In Shakspeare instances of 

 this syntax swarm so thick that many pages of 

 " N. & Q." would scant suffice for the transcription 

 of them. Let some few then stand for all. In 

 Troilus and Cressida, Act III. Sc. 3., are these 

 words : " they think my little stomach to the war, 

 and your great love to me restrains you thus." In 

 Cymbeline, Act II. Sc. 4., these, "your very good- 

 ness and your company overpays all I can do." In 

 Romeo and Juliet these, " need and oppression 

 starveth in thine eyes." In Hamlet these, Act II. 

 Sc. 2. : " whereat grieved that so his sickness, age, 

 and impotence was falsely borne in hand." In 

 Othello, Act II. Sc. 3., these, " thy honesty and 

 love doth mince this matter." Let the reader 

 specially note the next three examples, and he 

 will perhaps excuse one who has never come 

 under the ferule of the grammatical drill-sergeant, 

 for supposing that, besides authority, there was 

 sound grammatical reason for that syntax which 

 Mr. D'Israeli terms a " flagrant violation of gram- 

 mar," AWs Well that Ends Well, Act 11. Sc. 3., 

 " when I consider what great creation and what 

 dole of honour _^ies where you bid it.''' King Lear, 

 Act II. Sc. 1 ., " whose virtue and obedience doth 

 this instant so much commend itself." Spenser's 

 Faerie Queene, book ii. canto ii. st. 31., " but 

 lovely concord and most sacre<l peace doth nourish 

 virtue and fast friendship breeds ; weak she makes 

 strong, and strong thing does increase." Here a 

 plurality of nouns substantive embraces but a 

 single idea, and therefore, as it would seem, by 

 good consequence takes a singular verb ; and 

 more clearly to evince as much, a singular pro- 

 noun likewise, as lieutenant or representative of 

 those nouns. Lastly, there is some talk of a re- 

 vision of the liturgy : is that revision to include a 

 new version of the Lord's Prayer ? or are we to go 

 on, like our fathers, committing, according to Mr. 

 D'Israeli, " a flagrant violation of grammar " every 

 time that we say it ? or has that judicious critic 

 and distinguished scholar anticipated this by read- 

 ing for himself, " thine are the kingdom," &c., in- 

 stead of "thine is?" But these old-fashioned 

 examples and authorities may be of little account 

 with such as affect a newer mode of speech, and 

 the tongue which Spenser, and Shakspeare, and 

 Milton spake too rude for the dainty ears of a 

 more critical age, I will therefore cite an instance 

 from a modern, — one not a month old, from the 

 honourable member for Buckinghamshire himself, 

 who, arraigning the ambiguous conduct of the 

 .present advisers of the Crown, says (vide The 

 Times, May 25, p. 4. col. 1.), "upon whose con- 

 duct of thos^ duties deperids the greabiess of this 



country, and the happiness and prosperity of its 

 people." So resistless is the ingenuity of truth, so 

 speedily does the impulsive genius ot' the oratQl' 

 burst through the frigid cavils of the ped.ai)t, tljft% 

 in his very harangue upon that thesis, whiGhi 

 formed the substance of those notices by Major' 

 Reed, wherein he detected a flagrant violation of 

 grammar, Mr. D'Israeli is guilty of the same 

 violation which he condemned. One other Query 

 closes my paper. The phrase " foregone con- 

 clusion " has been so bandied to ami fi-o of late, 

 both in the House of Commons and elsewhere, 

 that it has almost degenerated into slang, but in a 

 sense quite different from its original use. When 

 spoken by Othello of his lieutenant, the " con- 

 clusion " is actual, not mental; it is a foregone 

 effect, not a predetermined ptirpose. When and by 

 whom was the phrase first thus invested with its- 

 new and now vulgar meaning ? 



W. R. Arrowsmith»^ 

 Broad Heath, Presteign. 



SIR WALTER SCOTT AT CAMBRIDGE. 



The Annual Biography and Obituary of 1837' 

 contains a memoir (signed M.D.) ot Jolin Chiike 

 Whitfield, Mus. Doc, Professor of Music in the- 

 University of Cambridge, who set to music many 

 of Sir Walter Scott's poems and songs. In this 

 memoir I find the subjoined passage : 



" In a visit Sir Walter made to Cambridge some years- 

 after, on his return from Waterloo, in the hope of hearing 

 some of his lays sung, the poet and the musician met for 

 the first time: this was the only personal interview they 

 ever had. In the course of conversation, Scott mentioned 

 an air published in a collection of Scotch songs, with ac- 

 companiments by Haydn and Beethoven, ' Oh cruel was 

 my father : ' the publisher says, ' This beautiful air, which 

 perhaps belongs to the south side the Tweed, w^as com- 

 municated to the editor by his friend Mr. Alexander 

 Ballantine of Kelso.' Dr. Whitfield replied, 'that was 

 the first air I ever composed, when sixteen years of age, 

 at Oxford.' It was singular, Sir Walter again mentioned 

 another song with admiration : ' That,' said the composer, 

 •is the last.'" — P. 133. 



This memoir contains four letters from Scott to 

 Whitfield, viz.: 1. Dated Edinburgh, Jan. 10, 

 1809. 2. Without date, but apparently written 

 in 1810, as it refers to a recent visit to the Isles. 



3. Dated Ashested (Ashestiel ?), Dec. 22, 1811. 



4. Dated Feb. 2, 1816. 



None of these letters are given in Lockhart's 

 Life of Scott, nor can I find in that work any 

 allusion to Scott's visit to Cambridge, or any 

 mention whatever of Dr. Whitfield. 



C. H. Cooper. 



Pambridge. 



