2nd S. VI. 153., Dec. 4. '68.1 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



459 



And my query will then extend farther. What 

 are the coats, — whether they are original in the 

 whole or in part, or whether they are to be found 

 in Norman families, and what the latter are ? 



H. C. C. 



Schiller's " Lucy " and Parody on it. — Some 

 letters have come into my possession written from 

 France and Germany by a clergyman during a 

 tour of three months in the autumn of 1801. In 

 one from Leipsic he describes a dramatic per- 

 formance which drew not only that town, but 

 many visitors from considerable distances. It 

 seems to have been a burlesque. The part which 

 excited the greatest applause was a domestic 

 scene in which a husband and wife admire their 

 inCant son, and weep over the charms of unso- 

 phisticated nature. "The boy throws himself on 

 his back and kicks with his heels in the air. The 

 father says, ' how beautiful is nature,' and does 

 the same. The actor is very short and fat, with 

 a pair of enormous boots. I was told it was a 

 parody on Schiller's Lucy. The audience shrieked 

 with delight." The writer did not understand Ger- 

 man, and received his interpretation from a Ger- 

 man in French, so he might easily mistake names. 

 Can any of your readers tell me the play seen, 

 and that which is called Schiller's " Lucy ? " 



H. S. J. 



Johnson and Warburton. — I happened to take 

 up not long ago Dr. Parr's once celebrated Letter 

 to Bishop Hicrd, — a production which, while it 

 affords a notable illustration of the odium plusrjuam 

 theologicurn of an unmitred Whig towards a mitred 

 one, is characterised by a robust and nervous 

 force of thought and expression of which we may 

 look in vain for a living example. It is there 

 mentioned that Johnson and Warburton met but 

 once during their long career of contemporaneous 

 authorship, and that they parted without " any di- 

 minution of mutual dislike." Can any of your 

 readers particularise the date and the place of 

 this conjunction of those two great luminaries of 

 that century — the fact that such a meeting took 

 place being confirmed by Johnson himself in one 

 of his summaries to Shakspeare's plays. He says, 

 " Dr. Warburton told me, ^c." a circumstance 

 which imparts some interest to the present in- 

 quiry. M. A. 



Mynchin, Myncliery, a Nun, or a Nunnery. — 

 In a modern dictionary these words are derived 

 from monachina. Now this word is not in Du 

 Cange or any of the Glossaries. A nun is usually 

 called monialis, except those of St. Clare, who are 

 Latinised minorissa. Has any reader met with 

 the word monachina f Is not the probable deri- 

 vation mynicene, or minicene? — See Wilkins' An- 

 glo-Saxon Laws, Canons of Edgur, and Liber 

 Coiutitutionum. A. A. 



I'oiita' Corner. 



The Letter Tau the Sign of the Hebrew JVation. 

 — In Guillim's Display of Heraldry it is stated 

 that every nation of antiquity had its particular 

 sign. Of this he gives several examples, as the 

 eagle for Rome, &c. 



In the Israelites he gives the Hebrew letter 

 tau (L3 ?) I should be glad to know on what 

 authority this is done, as I can find no ground for 

 it in the Old Testament. Vetds. 



Comets. — The most important fact related as to 

 these bodies appears to me to be this. It is said 

 that one of them passed through Jupiter's system, 

 close to some of his moons ; and did not derange 

 their eclipses even by one second of time. Will 

 any reader favour me by a reference to the period 

 when this occurred, and to a scientific account of 

 the pha3nomenon ? A. A. 



Poets' Corner. 



Daye's Perigrinatio Scholastica. — Can any of 

 3'our readers, learned in Elizabethan lore, tell me 

 whether the following MS. is known in print ? — 



" Perigrinatio Scholastica, or Learninges Pilgrimadge, 

 containeing the straundge Aduentures, and various In- 

 tertainements he found in his Trauailes towards the Shrine 

 of Latria, composed, and deuided into seuerall morall 

 Tractates, by John Daye, Cantabr." 



It is dedicated to " his verie worthie friende, 

 M'. Thomas Downtonn, Gentlemann, and brother 

 of the Right Wopp'. Companie of the Vintners." 



There is an acrostic by Day on Thomas Down- 

 ton in the Shakspeare Society's Papers, vol. i. p, 

 18. ; and it is pleasant to find that the old actor 

 was in sufiiciently good ease to make it worth 

 Day's while to dedicate a book to him. Unfortu- 

 nately I can find no trace of a date in any part of 

 the MS. G. H. K. 



A Point in Heraldry. — Erasmus in his Funus, 

 speaking of the tomb to be erected to the memory 

 of Balearcus, says, " nee deesset galeae suaj crista ; 

 crista erat onocrotali collum : nee clypeus laevo 

 brachio, in quo insignia haec erant, Tria capita 

 apri silvestris aurea, in planitie argentea," (Colloq. 

 p. 320., ed. London, 1692). ' Upon the latter pas- 

 sage there is a marginal note, by whom does not 

 appear : " Data opera fingit insignia vitiosa. Nam 

 caduceatorum leges habent, adulterina esse insig- 

 nia quce hahent metallum super metallum." 



Is this alleged rule to be found in any heraldic 

 writer of authority ? Perhaps it belonged to 

 foreign heraldry. The existence of such a rule 

 would indicate a curious state of moral and social 

 feeling. We all know that arms are sometimes 

 borne with marks of bastardy — how such arms 

 can be considered honourable may well be a ques- 

 tion : but it seems scarcely conceivable that any 

 person in any circumstances would consent to use 

 arms proclaiuiing an origin, not only illegitimate, 

 but also adulterous. David Gam. 



