504 



NOTES AND QUERIES, 



[2" d S. IX. June 30. '60. 



tarie of State to Philip II., who came hither into Eng- 

 land.'" The work, however, may be viewed as an amus- 

 ing specimen of the mystification which so often occurs 

 in French literature. ' In Spanish, it may be doubted 

 whether it ever existed at all, either as a printed book or 

 a MS. If, however, the French work was really, as it 

 professes to be, a translation, the supposed author of the 

 original was not, after all, Don Antonio Perez, Secretary 

 of State to Charles V. and Philip II., but the Portuguese 

 Dominican, Father J. Texera or Texeira; and the latter 

 appears, on this supposition, under the pseudonym of 

 "P. 01. [Pierre Olim] Pelerin Espagnol battu du Terns 

 et perse'cute' de la Fortune." Then, again, the name of 

 the professed translator into French has all the appear- 

 ance of being a disguise ; " J. D. Dralymont, Seigneur de 

 Yarleme," being, as there is every reason to think, merely 

 the anagram of " J. de Montlyard, Seigneur de Meleray." 

 Marchand, Diet. Hist., art. Montlyard. In the catalogue 

 given by Antonio (in his Biblioth. Hisp.) of writings, MS. 

 and published, by A. Perez, no mention is made of the 

 "Traite pare"netique ; " and it is almost superfluous to add 

 that the curious inquirer will in vain search the choro- 

 graphy of France for any such lordship as Yarleme."~\ 



Augustine Briggs, or Bridgs. — Information is 

 requested respecting; Augustine Briggs, or Bridgs, 

 who was mayor of Norwich in 1670, elected mem- 

 ber in 1677, and died in 1684. He was a trader, 

 and kept the sign of the " Cock on Tombland." 

 He also issued his token like many others. 



I shall be extremely obliged if anybody, who 

 could answer this, will do so either through " N. & 

 Q.," or to my address as under. 



Edw. A. Tillett. 



St. Andrews, Norwich, June 15, 1860. 



[A long notice of Augustine Briggs will be found in 

 Blomefield's Norfolk, iv. 217. 8vo. ed. 1806, with an en- 

 graving of his tablet.] 



Glastonbury Thorn. — Could any of your West 

 Country correspondents give any evidence as to 

 the truth of the story of the Glastonbury thorn ? 

 viz. that it always flowers on or about Christmas 

 Day. And whether descendants from it retain 

 the faculty ? R. T. 



[For a full account of the holy thorn that grew at 

 Glastonbury, see Warner's History of the Abbey of Glas- 

 ton, 4to., Bath, 1826, Appendix, pp. v. xxxvi. & xxxvii. 

 From the following extract it would appear that this 

 miraculous tree has long since disappeared : " It had two 

 trunks, or bodies, till the reign of Queen Elizabeth, in 

 whose days a saint-like Puritan taking offence at it 

 hewed down the biggest of the two trunks, and had cut 

 down the other body in all likelyhood, had he not bin 

 miraculously punished (saith my author) by cutting his 

 leg, and one of the chips flying up to his head, which nut 



out one of his eyes The remaining trunk, and the 



place where it grew, Mr. Broughton describes, and says 

 that it was as great ' as the ordinary body of a man, that 

 it was a tree of that kind and species, in all natural re- 

 spects, which we term a white thorn ; but it was so cut 

 and mangled round about in the bark, by engraving 

 people's names resorting thither to see it, that it was a 

 wonder how the sap and nutriment should be diffused 

 from the root to the boughs and branches thereof, which 

 were also so maimed and broken by comers hither, that 

 he wondered how it could continue any vegetation, or 

 grow at all ; yet the arms and boughs were spread and 



dilated in a circular manner as far or farther than other 

 trees freed from such impediments of like proportion, 

 bearing hawes (fruit of that kind) as fully and plentifully 

 as others do. In a word, that the blossoms of this tree 

 were such curiosities beyond seas, that the Bristol mer- 

 chants carried them into foreign parts ; that it grew upon 

 (or rather near) the lop of an hill, in a pasture bare and 

 naked of other trees, and was a shelter for cattle feeding 

 there, by reason whereof the pasture being great, and the 

 cattle many, round about the tree the ground was bare 

 and beaten as any trodden place. Yet this trunk was 

 likewise cut down by a military saint, as Mr. Andrew 

 Paschal calls him, in the rebellion which happened in 

 Charles I.'s time. However, there are at present divers 

 trees from it, by grafting and inoculation, preserved in 

 the town and country adjacent; amongst other places 

 there is one in the garden of a currier living in the prin- 

 cipal street, a second at the White Hart inn, and a third 

 in the garden of William Strode, Esq. There is a person 

 about Glastonbury who has a nursery of them, who, Mr. 

 Paschal tells us he is informed, sells them for a crown 

 a piece, or as much as he can get."] 



"Ne gry quidem" (2 nd S. ix. 485.) — Many 

 thanks for your kind and prompt reply to my 

 Query. On seeing your explanation of " gry " I 

 turned to Liddell and Scott's Lexicon (Oxford, 

 1855), to see whether the word ypv was to be 

 found in classical authors. I there found — 



"ypv, a grunt like that of swine; ovSe ypu irro/epiVao-Sai 

 =ovSe ypufai, not even to give a grunt, Ar. Pint. 17. ; so, 

 oiSeYpO, not a syllable, not a bit, Dem. 353. 10., Antiph. 

 IUous. 1. 13." 



This meaning of the word seems borne out by 

 the use of the verb ypifav by Aristophanes in his 

 Plutus, 454., where it is used in the sense to 

 grumble, to mutter, ypv^eiv 8e koX toXpmtov . . . (v. 

 Liddell and Scott on ypvfa). 



The object of my Note is to request you to add 

 to the obligation I am already under, by favouring 

 me with a classical authority for the use of the 

 word 7p0 in the sense of " the dirt that collects 

 under the nails ?" Libya. 



[It is out of our power to give any such authority that 

 can strictly be called classical ; but perhaps Libya will 

 like to see what is said on the subject by /Elius Hero- 

 dianus, who is supposed to have been born at Alexandria 

 in the second century, and who is styled by Priscian 

 " ruaximus auctor artis gramtnatiese." He writes, rpS, 

 ovtws eAeyoy t6v vrrb rta oi^u^t tov SolktvKov pvirov, oltto Se 

 toutou ital ttSlv to ppaxvTorov. (^E. Herodian. Phiietcerus, 

 appended to Pierson's Mceris.) In the list of " Verba im- 

 probata et expulsa" appended to Forcellini we find "Gry, 

 ypv, sordes sub unguibus."} 



ftrolteij. 



ALLEGED INTERPOLATIONS IN THE «TE 

 DEUM." 



(2 nd S. viii. 352.; ix. 31. 265. 367.) 



This rather important discussion cannot be left 

 in the unsatisfactory state in which the last com- 

 munication of A. H. W. leaves it. I perhaps, 

 therefore, may be permitted to vindicate the in- 

 tegrity of the " Te Deum," and to attempt to 



