Apeil 12. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



27.5 



The little sparrows which in hedges creep, 



Ere I was up did seem to bid me weep. 



If these do so, can I have feeling less, 



That am more apt to take and to express? 



No — l.t my own tunes be tlie mandrake's groan, 



If now they tend to mirth when all have none." 



Both these passages may have been quoted by 

 some of Campbell's predecessors. This might 

 justify him in not repeatin,' them, but not in 

 writing the criticism to which I have ventured to 

 object. His work holds a high rank in English 

 literature — it is taken as a text-book by the gene- 

 rality of readers ; for wliicli reasons I think that 

 every dictum it lays down ought to be examined 

 with more tiian usual care and attention. 



Compare with different parts of the "'Lament:" 



" And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, 

 Djwy with nature's tear drops, as they pass, 

 Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves. 

 Over the unreturning brave, — alas! 

 Ere evening to be trodden like the grass," &c. 



CJMle Haio'd, Canto iii. St. 27. 



" The morning of the day on which the fanner was 

 to be buried, was rendered remarkable by the uncom- 

 mon denseness of an autumnal fog. To ^Irs. Mason's 

 eye, it threw a gloom over the fai.'e of nature; nor, when 

 it gradually yielded to t!ie influence of the sun, and 

 slowly retiring from the valley, huns, as if rolled into 

 masses, mid-way upon the mountains, did the changes 

 thus produced excite any admiration. Still, wherever 

 she looked, all seemed to wear the aspect of sadness. 

 As she passed from Blorrison's to the house of mourn- 

 ing, the shocks of yellow corn, spangled with dew- 

 drops, appeared to her to stand as mementos of the 

 vanity of human hopes, and the inutility of human 

 labours. The cattle, as tliey went forth to pasture, 

 lowing as they went, seemed as if lamenting that the 

 hand wiiich fed them was at rest ; and even the Ilohin- 

 red-hreast, whose cheerful notes slie had so often lis- 

 tened to with pleasure, now seemed to send forth a 

 Song of sorrow, expressive of dejection and woe." — 

 Miss Ilamilton'o Cottagers of Gleiiburuie, ch ip. xii. 



C. Forbes. 

 Temple. 



iHtiiar ^aXti. 



''Ill the Sweat of thy Brow" (Vol. ii., p. 374.).— 

 To the scriptural misquotation referred to, you 

 may add another : 



" In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread." 



The true text reads, — 



" In the sweat of thy face shalt thou cat bread." — 

 Gen. iii. 19. 



The misquotation is so common, that a refer- 

 ence to a CDiicord.incc is necessary for proving to 

 many persons that it is not a scripture phrase. 



J. (jAI.LATLr. 



[In the WickliOite Bible lately published by the 



University of Oxford, the words are, " swoot of thi 

 cheer or face," and in some MSS. " cheer ether budi."] 



Anecdotes of Old Times (Vol. iii., p. 143.). — A 

 friend of mine has furnished me with the following 

 particulars, which may, perhaps, be interesting to 

 A. A. 



When the aunt of my friend married and began 

 housekeeping, there were only two tea-kettles be- 

 sides her own in the town of Knighton, Radnor- 

 shire. The clergyman of the parish forbad the 

 use of tea in his fiimily; but his sister kept a small 

 tea service in the drawer of the table by which 

 she sat at wo)k in the affernoon, and secretly 

 made herself a cup of lea at four o'clock, gently 

 closing the drawer if she heard her brother ap- 

 proacli. This clergyman's daughter died, at an 

 advanced age, in 1850. 



My friend's mother (who was born a year or 

 two before the battle of Culloden), having occasion 

 to visit London while living at Ludlow, went by 

 the waggon, at that time the only public convey- 

 ance on that road. A friend of hers wished to place 

 her daughter at a school in Worcester, and as she 

 kept no carriage, and was unable to ride on horse- 

 back, then the usual mode of travelling, she walked 

 from her residence in Knighton to Ludlow, and 

 thence to Worcester, accompanied by her daugh- 

 ter, who rode at a gentle pace beside her. 



Wedsecnarf. 



Foreign English. — Tlie following handbill is a 

 specimen of German English, and is stuck up 

 among other notices in the inn at Rastadt : 



" ADVICE OF AN HOTEL. 



" The underwritten has tlie honour of informing the 

 public that he has made the acquisition of the hotel to 

 the Savage, well situated in the middle of this city. 

 He shdl endeavour to do all duties which gentlemen 

 travellers can justly expect; and invites them to please 

 to convince themselves of it by their kind lodgings at 

 his house. Basil 



Jr. SiNGISEiM. 



Before the tenant of the Hotel to the Stork 

 in this city." 



Blowen. 



Uritannicus. — I gather the following anecdote 

 from the chajiter "Paper Wars of the Civil Wars" 

 in Disraeli's Quarrels of Aidhors. Sir John (Bir- 

 kenhead) is the repi'cscntative of tlie Mercurius 

 AuUcus, the Court Gazette ; Needham, of a Par- 

 liamentary Diurnal. 



" Sir John never condescends formally to reply to 

 Needham, for which he gives this singular reason : ' As 

 for this libeller, we are still resolved to take no notice, 

 till we find him able to spell his own name, which to 

 this hour BiuTANNicus never did.' In the next number 

 of Needham, who liiul always written it Brittaiiicus, the 

 correction was silently adopted." 



A similar error occurs on the shilling and si.x- 

 penny pieces of George III., circa 1817 (those 



