June 7. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



407 



take the Lint, and employ the many unoccupied 

 naves of our ecclesiastical buildings for religious 

 purposes on ordinary occasions. W. M. K. 



The Fifteen ffs (Vol. ili., p. 391.).— They are 

 sometimes called .S'^ Bridget's Prayers. I have a 

 very small volume entitled : 



" ^ A breefe Directory and playne way how to say 

 the Rosary of our blessed Lady : with Meditatiop.s for 

 such as are not exercised therein. Whereunto are 

 adioyned the prayers of S. Bryget with others. Bruges 

 Flandrorum, excudebat Hu. Holost. 1576." 

 At the end (beginning with fresh signature A i.) 

 are — 



" ^ Fifteene Prayers, righto good and vertuous' 

 vsually called the XV Oos, and of diuers called S. 

 Briget's prayers, because the holye and blessed Virgin 

 »sed dayly to say them before the Image of the Crucifix 

 in S. l^aules Church in Rome." 



Of this diminutive volume I never saw another 

 copy. It was published by J. M., who dates his 

 dedication to his dear sister A. M., " from the 

 Englishe Charter house in Bridges (sic), the vigil 

 of the Assumption of Our Lady, 1576." It seems 

 that the sister was resident in England, and had, 

 previously to her brother's departure for Bruges, 

 requested him to send her a translation of the 

 Rosary, which having obtained, his cousin and 

 friend J. Noel procureil it to be printed, J. ]M. 

 willingly confessing " for that I know there be 

 many good women in Englande that honour Our 

 Lady, but good bookes to stirre vp deuotion in 

 them are scarse." AVould not a list of English 

 books printed abroad be an interesting subject for 

 some bibliographical antiquary, and an acceptable 

 addition to our literary antiquities ? P. B. 



Bunyan and the Visions of Heaven and Hel I 

 (Vol. iii., p. 89.). — ]Mr. Offor has very satis- 

 factorily shown that Bunyan could not, from its 

 grandiloquent style, have been the author of the 

 Visions of Heaven and Hell, attributed to him in 

 an edition of that work published in the reign of 

 George I., entitled. The Visions of John Bunyan, 

 being his last Bemains. 



This title must have been a surreptitious one, 

 for, since Me. Offor made the above communi- 

 cation, I liave obtained a copy of this scarce book 

 published in the previous reign, under its legiti- 

 mate title (as in the Sunderland copy of 1771, 

 mentioned at p. 70. supra), and said to be " By 

 G L. (piKavBpwvo. London, printed for John Gwil- 

 lim, against Crossly Square in Bishopsgate-street, 

 1711." 



In his address " To the Header" (also signed 

 G. L.), the author even makes the following direct 

 allusion to Bunyan's allegory : 



" And since the Jf^ay to Heaven has been so taking 

 under the similitude of a drerim, why should not tlie 

 Journey's End be as acceptable under the similitude of 



a vision ? Nay, why should it not be more acceptable, 

 since the end is preferable to the riienns, and Heaven to 

 the Way that brings us thither ? The Pilgrim met with 

 many difficulties ; but here they are all over. All 

 storms and tempests here are hush'd in silence and 

 serenity." 



It will therefore, I think, be admitted that the 

 name of Bunyan ought no longer to be associated 

 with this work, and that all inferences drawn from 

 the fallacy of his having been the author of it 

 should henceforth be disregarded. 



It would, however, be desirable, if possible, to 

 ascertain who G. L. really was, and bow the 

 spurious title-page came to be affixed by "Edward 

 Midwinter, at the Looking-Glass upon London 

 Bridge," to his edition of this allegory ? N. H. 



Mazer Wood (Vol. iii., pp. 2.39. 288 ). — 

 Your Querist asks, " Has the word Mazer any 

 signification in itself?" It signifies iJ/ayj/e, being 

 a corruption of the "Welsh word Masarn — the 

 maple-tree. Probably, therefore, the use of the 

 wood of the maple tor bowls and drinking-cups 

 prevailed in this country many centuries before 

 the times of Spenser and Chaucer, in whose works 

 they are mentioned. In Devonshire the black 

 cherry-tree, which grows to a large size in that 

 county, is called the mazer-tree. From this cir- 

 cumstance I conjecture that this wood has been 

 used there in former times for bowls and drinking- 

 cups as a substitute for maple. That the original 

 word, mazer, should have been retained, is not to 

 be wondered at. It is known that when the mazer 

 bowl was made of silver, the old name was re- 

 tained. The name of the maple-tree, in the Irish 

 language, is crann-mhalpais ; therefore the name 

 of the Irish wooden driuking-cup mtedher cannot 

 be derived from it. S. S. S. 



Roberta Spharia (Vol. iii., p. 398.). — Any of 

 your readers who are curious in natural history 

 will find, in the Pharmaceutical Journal, vol. ii. 

 p. 591., a very full description of this extraordinary 

 production, by Dr. Pereira. It is used as a 

 medicine by the Chinese, by whom it is called the 

 " summer-plant-winter-worm," and who attribute 

 to it great cordial and restorative powers. The 

 mode of employing it is curious. A duck is stufitid 

 with five drachms of the insect fungus, and roasted 

 by a slow fiie ; when done, the stuffing is taken 

 out, the virtue of which has passed into the 

 duck, which is to be eaten twice a day for eight 

 or ten days. In the same work, vol. iv. p. 204., 

 Dr. Pereira gives a further account of the moth 

 on whose larva the fungus grows. E. N. W. 



Southwark, May 19. 1851. 



Count Xavier de Maistre (Vol. iii., p. 227.) — 

 I notice a slight inaccuracy in Mr. Singeu's re- 

 ference to the author of Voyage autour de ma 

 Chambre. lie gives the naipe as " Jeap Xavier 



