424 



NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



[2°* S. IX. June 2. '60. 



©uertetf. 



PETER BASSET, A LOST HISTORIAN OF THE 

 REIGN OF HENRY V. 



Various historians of the reign of Henry V. 

 have been given to the public in a printed form : 

 from the time when Hearne published Titus 

 Livius and Thomas of Elmham, down to our 

 own days, when the history of this period has 

 occupied one of the volumes of the English Histo- 

 rical Society, and one of those now appearing 

 under the patronage of the Master of the Rolls. 

 I allude to 



"Henrici Quinti, Anglice Regis, Gesta. Edited by 

 Benjamin Williams. F.S.A. 1850." 



"Memorials of King Henry the Fifth, King of Eng- 

 land. Edited bv Charles Augustus Cole, of the Public 

 Record Office. 1858." 



But neither in the work of Mr. Williams, nor in 

 that of Mr. Cole, nor in the volume on the Battle of 

 Agincourt bv Sir Harris Nicolas, nor in the Memoirs 

 of Henry the Fifth, by Rev. J. Endell Tyler, 2 vols. 

 8vo. 1838, do I find any mention of Peter Basset, 

 who is stated by our old literary biographer Bale, 

 and his followers, to have written very minute 

 memoirs" of Henry V. and all his achievements. 

 Peter Basset, Esq , according to Bale, was cham- 

 berlain to King Harry of Monmouth, and re- 

 mained by his side during all his career, both at 

 home and abroad. His book of the "Acts of 

 Henry the Fifth" was written, says Bale, in the 

 English language, and it is thus very amply de- 

 scribed and applauded : — 



"Petrus Basset, elari generis armiger, et Henrico 

 quinto Anglorum regi a cubiculis, eorum omnium testis 

 oculatissimus foil, quaj idem rex uiagnificus tarn apud 

 Anglos quam etiam in Gallis olim fecit. Nam aderat 

 ill i ad latus semper hie Petrus, seu domi seu foris quic- 

 quam ageret, sive vel in pace vel in bello fuisset occu- 

 patus, et omnibus in locis notabat ejus turn dicta turn 

 facta pnecipua. Descripsit illius ab ipsis incunabulis 

 vitam, varias in Franciam expeditiones, gloriosas de 

 Gallis victorias ac triumphos: cum Carolo sexto Franco- 

 rum rege pacificationem, et affinitatem post bella, atque 

 tandem ejus regni administrationem plenissimam, Henrico 

 filio regi ipsius diademate Parisiis turn demum insignito. 

 Et haec omnia in ejus regis laudem plenissime conges- 

 sit, cdito in Anglico sermone libro, cui titulum fecit 

 Acta Regis Henrici Quinti. lib. I. 



" PraHer hoc, nihil opusculorum ejus cxtare novi. Et 

 ubi scriptorum aliqui pnedictuin regem ex venenata po- 

 tione, alii ex fiacrii malo aut igne Antouii interiisse 

 fingunt, iste ex pleuresi obiisse ilium affirmat. Claruit 

 Petrus, Anno Domini 1430, Henrico sexto regnante." 

 (Scriptorum Brytannice cent. vii. No. 80. Folio, Basil. 

 1557, p. 568.) 



Pitsseus (4to. 1619, p. 615.) copies Bale's ac- 

 count (turning it, as usual, into different lan- 

 guage). Tanner, in his Bihliotheca Britannica, 

 makes a slight abstract of tbe same, and adds the 

 title of another production attributed to the same 

 author : — 



" De Actis Armorum et Conquestus Regni Francia;, du- 

 catus Normannife, ducatus Alenconise, ducatus Andegavise 



et Cenomannia;, &c, ad nobilem virum Johannem Fal- 

 stof, baronem de Cyllyequotem, per Petrum Basset. MS. 

 in Bibl. Offic. Armorum, Lond." 



On examining Mr. W. H. Black's Catalogue of 

 the Arundel MSS. in the College of Arms, I do 

 not find any paper bearing this title, though there 

 are several documents connected with the history 

 of the famous Sir John Fastolfe in the MS. Arun- 

 del xlviii. 



The only trace that I have found of Peter Bas- 

 set's memoirs subsequent to John Bale (and what 

 has been copied from him) is in Hall's Chronicle, 

 where he is quoted with reference to the disease 

 of which King Henry died : — 



" Some say he was poysoned. The Scottes write that 

 he died of the disease of S. Fiacre, whiche is a palsey and 

 a crampe. Engurrant sa3'eth that he died of S. Antho- 

 nies tier, but al these be but fables as many mo write. 

 For Peter Basset, esquire, which at the time*of his death 

 was his chamberlain, affirmeth that he died of a plurisis, 

 whiche at that t3'ine was so rare a sickenes and so straunge 

 a disease that the name was to the most part of men un- 

 knowen, and physicions were acquainted as lytle with any 

 remedy for the same." 



In his list of " Englishe Writers " appended to 

 his Preface, Hall gives that of " Ihon Basset," 

 which was possibly meant for Peter. 



It seems not improbable that the substance of 

 Peter Basset's work may have been worked up 

 by Hall ; but it is singular that his name as a con- 

 temporary historian should have been entirely 

 lost sight of, and it would be desirable to identify 

 his composition, if still existing in its original form, 

 particularly as, if Bale's description of it was a 

 true one, it must have been a very interesting 

 work. John Gough Nichols. 



IRISH CELEBRITIES : GARIBALDI, ETC. 



The following scrap from the veracious columns 

 of the Limerick Chronicle is so racy of the soil as 

 to deserve the immortality of a corner in " N. & 

 Q " : - 



"It is said that Garibaldi is another illustrious Irish- 

 man, and that he was born in Mullinahone, in the county 

 of Tipperary ; that his father, Garrett Baldwin, was a 

 schoolmaster, and nicknamed for shortness, as well as 

 affectionate familiarity, by his pupils, ' Garry Bald}'.' 

 On the death of the pedagogue, his son, Garry Baldy, jun., 

 proceeded to Rome to his uncle, an ecclesiastic in that 

 city, where the liquid sobriquet chiming in with the 

 euphonious language of love and poetry, he adopted it 

 and immortalised it by his chivalrous bravery." — Limerick 

 Clironicte. 



Certainly we Hibernians have latterly not been 

 backward in laying claim to the celebrities of the 

 day as " illustrious Irishmen." Not to mention 

 Marshals M'Mahon and O'Donnell, whose names 

 bespeak their Celtic origin, we are assured that 

 the Duke de Malakhoff is of Irish descent, and 

 that Pellisier is only the French form of Palliser. 

 Indeed the former name is not unknown here, for 



