Aug. 23. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



131 



the time it was so, as the English duke did not 

 accompany the French king. 1 believe that the 

 additional verse was as follows : — 



" God save noble Clarence 

 Who brings our king to France, 



God save Clarence; 

 He maintains the glory 

 Of the British navy, 

 Oh ! God, make him happy, 



God save Clarence." 



I am sorry that I can only speak from memory 

 of the contents of a document which I have not 

 seen for so many years ; but if I have made any 

 mistake, perhaps some reader may be able to 

 correct me. S. R. M. 



Birds Care for the Dead. — It is not uncommon 

 to find in poets of all ages some allusion to the 

 pious care of particular birds for the bodies of the 

 dead. Is there any truth in the idea? for certainly 

 the old ballad of '• The Cliildren in the AVood" has 

 made many a kind friend for the Robin Redbreast 

 by the affecting lines : 



" No burial this pretty pair 

 Of any man receives, 

 Till Rubin Redbreast piously 

 Did cover them with leaves." 



Herrick also alludes to the same tradition in his 

 verses " upon ]\Irs. Elizabeth Wheeler, under the 

 name of Amarillis." {fVorks, vol. i. pp. 62-3. : 

 Edin. 1823.) 



" Sweet Amarillis, by a spring's 

 Soft and soule-melting murmurings, 

 Slept ; and thus sleeping, thither flew, 

 A Rol>in Redbreast; who at view, 

 Not seeing her at all to stir, 

 Brought leaves and moss to cover her ; 

 But v/hile he, perking, there did prie 

 About the arch of cither eye. 

 The lid began to let out day. 

 At which poor Robin flew away; 

 And seeing her not dead, but all disleav'd. 

 He chirpt for joy, to see himself disceav'd." 



In the earlier editions of Gray's Elegy, before 

 the Epitapli, the following exquisite lines were 

 inserted : 



" There scatter'd oft, the earliest of the year. 

 By hands unseen, are showers of violets found : 

 The Redbreast loves to build and warble there. 

 And little footsteps lightly print the ground." 



And about the same time Collins's "Dirge in 

 Cymbeline" liad adorned the "fair Fidele's grassy 

 tomb" with the same honour : 



" The Redbreast oft, at evening liours, 

 Sliall kindly lend liis little aid, 

 With hoary moss, and gather'd flowers, 

 To deck tlie ground where thou art laid." 



Rt. 



Warmington, Aug. 9. 1851. 



Sjtake's Antipathy to Fire. — There is in Brazil 

 a very common poisonous snake, the Surucucu 

 (Trigonocephalus rhombeatiui), respecting which the 

 Matutos and Sertanejns, the inhabitants of the 

 interior, relate the following facts. They say that 

 such is the antipathy of this reptile to fire, that 

 when fires are made in the clearing away of woods, 

 they rush into it, scattering it with their tails till 

 it is extinguished, even becoming half roasted in 

 the attempt ; and that when an individual is pass- 

 ing at night with a torch, they pass and repass 

 him, lashing him with their tales till he drop it, 

 and the snake is immediately found closely coiled 

 round the extinguished torcli. The greatest enemy 

 of this snake is an immense Lacertian, five and six. 

 feet long, the Tiju-acju (the great lizard — its name 

 in the Lingoa geral) : it is said that when the snake 

 succeeds in effecting a bite, the lizard rushes into 

 the wood, eats some herb, and returns to the con- 

 flict, which almost invariably terminates in its 

 favour. John Manley. 



Pernambuco, June 30. 1851. 



Aldgate, London. (A Note for London Anti- 

 quaries.) — After this gate was taken down in 1760, 

 Sir Walter Blackett, of Wallington, Northumber- 

 land, obtained some of the ornamental stones (part 

 of the City arms, heads and wings of dragons, ap- 

 parently cut in Portland stone, and probably set 

 up when the gate was rebuilt in 1606), and used 

 them in decorating Rotliley Castle, an eye-trap 

 which he erected on the crags of that name, near 

 AVallington. W. C. Tkevelyan. 



Wallington, Aug. 11. 1851. 



Erroneous Scripture Quotations. — Some of your 

 correspondents have done good service by draw- 

 ing attention to these things. Has it ever 

 occurred to you that the apple is a fruit never 

 connected in Scripture with the fall of man; — 

 that Eve was not Adam's helpmate, but merely a 

 helf) meet for him ; — and that Absalom's long hair, 

 of which he was so proud, and which has conse- 

 quently so often served "to point a moral and 

 adorn a tale," had nothing to do with his death, 

 his head itself, and not the hair upon it, having 

 been caught in the boughs of the tree ? P. P. 



CSucric^. 



THE LADY ELIZABETH HOENER OR MONTGOMERY. 



In some curious manuscript memoirs of the 

 family of Horner of Mells, co. Somerset, written 

 probably about the middle of the last century, I 

 find the following statement : — 



" The gentleman at Mells last mentioned, whose 

 name 1 don't know, had his eldest son Genrt/e, who suc- 

 ceeded him at Mells. He married the Countess of 

 Montgomery, su|)|)osed to be the widow of that earl, 

 who, in tilting with Henry II., King of Fiance, caused 



