Dec. 28. 1850.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



519 



Moreover, he notes particularly the change of 

 voice, a curious circumstance, which testifies per- 

 sonal acquaintance. Hobbes died in 1679 ; Bunyan 

 in 1688. Were they intimate ? 



Jas. H. Feiswell. 



Boiling to Death.— Some of your correspondents 

 have counnunicrtted instances where burning to 

 death was inflicted as a punishment ; and Mr. 

 Gatty suggests that it would prove an interesting 

 subject for uiquiry, at what period such barbarous 

 inflictions ceased.' In Howe's Chronicle I find the 

 two following notices : 



" The 5tli of Aprill (\5S2) one Richard Rose, a 

 cookf, was boiled in .Smltlifielde, for poisoning of divers 

 persons, to the iniinber of sixteen or more, at y'^ Bishop 

 of Rochester's place, amongst the which Benet Cur- 

 wine, gentleman, was one, and hee intended to have 

 poisoned the biaiop himselfe, but hee eate no potage 

 that day, whereby hee escaped. Marie the poore people 

 that eate of them, many of them died." — Howe's 

 Chronicle, p. 559. 



" The 17th March (1542) Margaret Dany, a maid, 

 was boiled in Smithfield for poisoning of three house- 

 holds that shee had dwelled in." — Howe's Chronicle, 

 p. 5S3. 



Query, was this punishment peculiar to cooks 

 guilty of poisoning? And when did the latest 

 instance occur ? L- H- K- 



Meaning o/ "MwAer." — To-day I went into 

 the cottage of an ohl man, in the village of which I 

 am curate, and finding him about to cut up some 

 wood, and he being very iiilirm, I undertook the 

 task I'or him, and chop])ed up a fagot for his fire. 



During the ]irogrcss of my work, the old fellow 

 made the following observation : — 



" Old Nannie Hawkins have got a big stick o' wood, 

 and she says as I shall have him for eight pence. If I 

 could get him, I'd soon mocker him." 



Upon my asking hiin the meaning of the word 

 vioclu-r, he informed me it meant to divide or 

 cleave in pieces; but, not being " a scholar" as he 

 termed it, he could not tell me how to .spell it, so I 

 know not whether the orthography I have adopted 

 is correct or not. 



Can any of your readers give nie a clue to the 

 derivation of this word? 1 certainly never heard 

 it before. 



I ou',dit perhaps to state, that this is a country 

 parisii in llerel'ordshire. W. JM. 



Peinliridgc, Dec. 16. 



'■'■Away, let nought to love displeasing." — Is it 

 known who was the author of the song to be f()und 

 ill Tercy's llelifjues, and many other collections, 

 beginning — 



" Away, let nought to love displeasing." 



The first collection, so far as I know, in which 

 it appears is entitled Miscellaneom Poems hy 

 several Hands, published by D. Lewis, London, 

 1 726 ; and in this work it is called a translation 

 from the ancient British. Does this mean a trans- 

 lation of an ancient poem, or a translation of a 

 poem written in some extant dialect of the lan- 

 guage anciently spoken in Britain ? Either would 

 appear to me incredible. 



As I feel much interested in the poetry of 

 English songs, can you or any of your correspon- 

 dents inform me if there e.xists any good collec- 

 tion ; that is, a collection of such only as are 

 excellent of tiieir respective kinds? That the 

 English Language possesses materials for forming 

 such a collection, and an extensive one too, I have 

 no doubt, though I have never met with one. 

 And, if there be none that answers the descrip- 

 tion I give, I should be glad of information re- 

 specting the best that exist. 



It is scarcely necessary to add, that my standard 

 of excellence would admit only those which bore 

 the character of " immortal verse," rejecting such 

 as had been saved merely by the music to which 

 they had been " married." Samuel Hickson. 



Dec. 14. 1850. 



Baron 31 ilnchausen. — Who was the author of 

 this renowned hero's adventures ? The Conversa- 

 tions-Lexicon (art. Munchausen) states that the 

 stories are to be found under the title of " Men- 

 dacia Kidicula," in vol. iii. of Delicice Academics, 

 by J. P. Lange (Hellbronn, 1665); and that " at 

 a later period they appeared in England, where a 

 re.'iewer supposed them to be a satire on the 

 ministry." I reiuember to have read when a boy 

 (I think in The Percy Anecdotes), that the book 

 was written by an Englishman who was styled 



" M ," and was described as having been long 



a prisoner in the Bastille. 



Since writing thus far I have seen the note by 

 J. S. (Vol. ii., pp. ■262-.3.) on Munchausen's story 

 of the horn. The idea of sounds frozen in the 

 air, and thawed by returning warmth, was no in- 

 vention of " Castilian, in ]\\s Ai/licus" (i.e. Cas- 

 tiglione, author of II Cortegiano) ; for, besides 

 that it is ibund in his contemporary Rabelais 

 (liv. iv. cc. 55-6 ), I believe it may bo traced to 

 one of the later Greek writers, from whom Bishop 

 Taylor, in one of his sermons, borrows it as an 

 illustration. J. C. 11. 



" Sing Tantararaj'a Rogues all," Sj'c. — The above 

 is tiie chorus of many satirical songs written to 

 expose the malpractices of peculators, &c. Can 

 any of your readers point out who was the author 

 of the original song, and where it is to be found ? 



A SUBSORIUER. 



Meaning of " CauJiivg." — An old dame told me 

 the other day, in Cheshire, that her servant was a 



