Dec. 20. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



483 



Literature, under the head of "Imitations and 

 Similarities," to the French poet, De Caux, who, 

 comparing the world to his hour-glass, says — 



" C'est une verre qui luit, 



Qii'uii souffle peat detruire, et qu'un souffle a produit." 



The turn given to the thought in the French \ 

 has suggested to D'Israeli an emendation of the 

 passage in Goldsmith. He proposes that the word j 

 *' unmakes" should be substituted for " can ' 

 make." The line would then read — 



" A breath unmakes them, as a breath has made." 



This emendation seems to me to be alike inge- 

 nious and well-founded. The line itself is but the 

 corollary of the one that precedes it ; and in order 

 to make the sense complete, it should contain anti- 

 thetical expressions to correspond with "flourisli" 

 and " fade." Now, between " can make " and 

 " made " tliere is nothing antithetical ; but between 

 "made" and "unmakes" there is. 



In support of this \iesv, I may quote one or two 

 parallel passages, in which the antithesis is pre- 

 served. The first is a quatrain commemorating 

 the devastating effects of an earthquake in the 

 valley of Lucerne in 1808 : 



" O del ! ainsi ta Providence 



A tous les maux nous coiidamna : 

 Un souffle eteint notre existence 

 Coinine uu souffle nous la donna." 



The second is a line which occurs in Curiosities 

 of Literature, and which I am compelled to quote 

 from memory, having no access to that work. It 

 is as follows : 



" A breath renived him, but a breath o'erthrew." 



That Goldsmith wrote the line in question with 

 the word " unmakes," there seems little reason to 

 doubt. To say of princes and lords that " a breath 

 can make them, as a breath has made," far from 

 conveying any idea of their " fading," would be, 

 on the contrary, to indicate the facile process by 

 which they may be perpetuated. It would show 

 ho.v tliey may " flourish," but not how they may 

 " fade." 



Although this emendation in Goldsmith was 

 pointed out many years ago, and recommends itself 

 by its appositeness, and its obvious adaptation to 

 the conte.-it, yet I believe it has never been intro- 

 duced into any edition of that pf)et. I have before 

 me two copies of The Deserted Village, and both 

 contain the words " can make." As, however, 

 among the many useful hints thrown out by 

 " Notes and Queeies," that of suggesting the 

 emendation of obscure or difficult passages in our 

 poets, appears to have met with the approbation 

 of y<jur readers, I trust some future editor of 

 Goldsmith may be induced to notice this jjassage, 

 and restore the text to its original accuracy. 



IIeNRT II. I3B££N. 



St. Lucia. 



iHtnor IJotCiS. 

 Biographical Dictionary. — May I beg for the 

 assistance of "Notes and Queries" to enforce a 

 want which I am sure is daily felt by thousands of 

 educated Englishmen ? Tlie want I speak of is 

 that of a good Biographical Dictionary, coming 

 down to the middle of the century ; a dictionary 

 as good as the Biog. Uiiioerselle for foreign lives, 

 and a hundred times better for English lives. Every 

 one knows how meagre and unsatisfactory is that 

 otherwise magnificent work in its English part. 

 Why should we not have an abridged translation, 

 with the home portion re-written ? Z. Z. Z. 



The Word Premises. — The use of the word pre- 

 mises for houses, lands, and hereditaments, is surely 

 incorrect. I have never found the word prcemissu 

 used in any Latin writer in a sense that can 

 sanction the modern application of its derivative. 

 Johnson's authority supports the view that the 

 word is perverted in being made to stand for 

 houses and lands, as he says it is " in low language" 

 that the noun stibstantive "premises" is used in 

 that sense, as, " I was upon the premises'' &c. 

 The office of "the premises" in a deed, say the 

 Law Dictionaries, is to express the names of the 

 grantor and grantee, and to specify the thing 

 granted. '■'■ The. premises is the former part of a 

 deed, being all that which precedeth the habendum 

 or limitation of the estate." I believe the term 

 "parcels" is applied, technically, to the specifi- 

 cation of the property which forms the subject of 

 a deed. In an instrument, it may not be wholly 

 incorrect to refer by the term "premises" to the 

 particulars premised, and, if an etymological 

 inaccuracy, it may be excused for the sake of 

 avoiding repetitions ; but surely we ought not to 

 speak of houses, lands, &c. by this term. I see I 

 am not the first to call an editor's attention to this 

 point, for, in the Gentleman's Magazine of Jan., 

 179o, a correspondent complains of this improper 

 application of the word, and attributes the per- 

 version to the lawyers, " who," he says, " for the 

 sake of brevity (to which, by-the-bye, they are not 

 much attached), have accustomed themselves to 

 the phrase, ' the aforesaid premises' whence the 

 word has come to be universally taken as a col- 

 lective noun, signifying manors, tenements, and 

 so on." The absurdity of such a use of the word 

 is illustrated by putting it for animals, household 

 goods, and personal estate, for which it may as 

 well stand as for lands and houses. AY. S. G. 



Newcastle-upon-Tyne. 



Plai/ of George Bai-nwell : — 



" Last Friday a messenger came from Hampton 

 Court to tlie I'lay House by the Queen's command, 

 for tlie manuscript of George Barnwell, for Her Ma- 

 jesty's perusal, which IMr. Wilks carried to Hampton 

 Court early on Saturday morning ; and we hear it is 

 to be performed shortly at the Theatre iu Hampton 



