168 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 41. 



source extant of information on Ensjlish etymology, 

 because I cannot help thinking that it has very 

 many faults and deficiencies. The very word, for 

 instance, on tlie derivation of which your valuable 

 correspondent Mr. Forbes offered a suggestion in 

 No. 38., viz. Martinet, I had in vain sought for in 

 Mr. Richardson's Dictionary^ at least in his quarto 

 .edition, 1837. Pkiscian. 



" Querela Cantahrigiensis" — Is anything known 

 of the authorship of the Querela Cantahrigiensis: 

 or, a Remonstrance by way of Apologie for the 

 banished Members of the late flourishing University 

 of Cambridge. By some of the said Sufferers. 

 Anno Dom. 1647 ? This seems a favourable time 

 for inserting this Query, as there is a chance of a 

 second series of " The Universities' Complaint" 

 making its appearance before the year is out. 



Long Lonkin. — Can any of your readers give 

 me a clue to the personality of Long Lonkin, the 

 hero of a moss-trooping ballad popular in Cum- 

 berland, which commences — 



" The Lord said to his ladie. 

 As he mounted his horse. 

 Beware of Long Lonkin 

 That lies in the moss." 



And goes on to tell how Long Lonkin crept in at 

 "one little window" which was left unfastened, 

 and was counselled by the wicked maiden to — 

 " Prick the bahe in the cradle" 



as the only means of bringing down the poor 

 mother, whom he wished to kill. 



Are there any other traditions of him, and can 

 he have any connection with the name bestowed 

 by children on the middle finger, in the following 

 elegant rhyme ? — 



" Tom Thumbkin, 

 Will WiJkins, 

 Long Lonkin," &c. ? 



This I had always supposed merely to refer to the 

 length of the finger, but the coincidence of names 

 is curious. Seleucus. 



TREATISE OF EQUIVOCATION, 



I can now inform yoix that the IMS. Treatise of 

 Equivocation, about which J. M. inquired (Vol. i., 

 p. 263.), is preserved in the Bodleian Library 

 (Laud, Miscellaneous MSS. 655.). Dodd, in his 

 Church History (vol. ii. pp. 38L 428.), under the 

 names Blackwell and Francis Tresham, mentions 

 the work by its second title, A Treatise against 

 Lying and fraudident Dissimidation, and states that 

 the MS. is in the Bodleian. Through the kindness 

 of Dr. Baudinel, I have seen the tract ; and as 

 there is a certain historical interest attached to it. 



some information on the subject may be acceptable 

 to your readers. But it may be as well first to 

 give the account of its production at the trial of 

 Guy Fawkes and the conspii-ators, Jan. 27, 1606. 

 (See State Trials, vol. ii. col. 180.) After Coke 

 had introduced under the seventh head of his 

 speech, as the fourth means for carrying on the 

 plot, "their perfidious and perjurious equivocat- 

 ing," there follows : — 



" And here was showed a Book, written not long 

 before the Queen's death, at what time Thomas Winter 

 was employed into Spain, entituled, ' A Treatise of 

 Equivocation,' which book being seen and allowed by 

 Garnet, the superior of the Jesuits, and Blackwell, the 

 Archpriest of England, in the beginning thereof Garnet 

 with his own hand piit out those words in the title of 

 ' Equivocation,' and made it thus: ' A Treatise against 

 Lying and fraudulent Dissimulation.' .... And in the 

 end thereof, Blackwell besprinkles it with his blessing, 

 saying, ' Tractatus iste valde doctus, et vere plus et Ca- 

 tholicus est. Certe S. Scripturarum, patruin, doctorum, 

 scholasticorum, canonistarum, et oplimanim rationum 

 prsesidiis plenissime firmat ajquitatem jequivocationls ; 

 ideoque dignissimus est qui typis propagetur, ad con- 

 solationem afflictorura Catholicoruui, et omnium pi- 

 orura instructionem.' " 



Coke referred to it again at Garnet's trial, 

 March 28, 1606 {State trials, vol. ii. p. 234.) ; 

 and the importance attached to the discovery of 

 the work may be judged of by Morton's F^dl 

 Satisfaction, 1606 : a very large part of which is 

 occupied in discussing it. 



The copy in the Bodleian is the one which was 

 produced at the trial. It is a small quarto in a 

 vellum cover, on the outside of which is written, 

 on the front side, in a later hand, " Blackwell de 

 Equivocatione, &c. ;" on the other side, in Sir E. 

 Coke's hand, " Equivocations." It consists of 

 sixty-six pages in all ; i. e. two leaves at the be- 

 ginning originally left blank, and not numbered ; 

 sixty-one pages numbered continuously, and fifty- 

 nine of them written on: p. 61., that is, the fly- 

 leaf at the end, contains Blackwell's imprimatur 

 as described by Coke. On the first fly-leaf, at the 

 beginninii, is the following memorandum : — 



" This booke, contening 61 pages, I founde in a 

 chamber in the Inner Temple, wherein S' Thomas 

 Tresham used to lye, and whiche he obteyned for his 

 two younger sonnes. This 5 of December, 1605. 

 Euw. Coke. 



" Os quod mentitur occidit animam." 



It may be enough to remind the reader, that 

 after Nov. 5, 1605, Coke, being Attorney-General, 

 was engaged in prosecuting the discovery of the 

 plot and seeking for evidence. Francis Tresham, 

 to whom the authorship is attributed by Dodd 

 (vol. ii. p. 427, 428.), was a son of Sir Thomas Tre- 

 sham ; his connection with Garnet and the plot is 

 well known. Sir T. Tresham died Sept. 11, 1605. 

 (Dodd, vol. ii. p. 58.) Francis had been committed 



