Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/176

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170


NOTES AND QUERIES, [ii s. vm. AUG. so, 1913.


DISRAELI QUERIES. I shall be glad if any of your readers can help me with replies to any of the following queries.

(a) Where are any of the following quota- tions and statements to be found in Disraeli's writings or speeches ?

1. The " blundering and plundering " reference to the Government of the day.

2. "There is no love but at first sight."

3. "I am bound to furnish my antagonists with arguments, but not with comprehension."

4. " Youth is a blunder, manhood a struggle, old age a regret."

5. The statement that only those nations that behaved well to the Jews prospered.

6. The statement that a clever fool is the worst of all.

7. The phrase " Claret with the odour of the violet."

8. "Take this as an incontrovertible principle accept this as a moral dogma of your life every man has hi 3 opportunity."

9. " With words we govern men."

10. The statement that when he wanted to read a good book he wrote one.

(b) The phrase " swell of soul " is said to have been derived from Bolingbroke. Where did Disraeli find it ? and where does he use- it ?

(c) The phrase " men of light and leading " is said to have come from Burke. Where does he use it ? J. A. L. F.

[Mr. W. Gurney Benham in * Cassell's Book of Quotations ' notes the following :

1. Letter to Lord Grey de Wilton, October, 1873.

2. ' Henrietta Temple,' Book II. chap. iii. 4. * Sidonia,' Book III. chap. i.

9. ' Contarini Fleming,' Part I. chap. xxi. (c) Disraeli, 'Sybil,' Book V. chap. i. ; Burke,

  • Reflections on the Revolution.']

RING WITH A DEATH'S HEAD. It would be interesting to know whether this cheerful form of souvenir, bequeathed by will, was usual, whether it was a sacred emblem, and whether any such curiosities still exist. The following two instances are from wills in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury.

In 1636 (113 Pile) Margaret Griffithes (nee Fairclough), widow of the Dean of Hereford and a cousin of Bishop Robert Benett, be queathed " to my son-in-law Isake Morgan my ring with a death's head to wear in remembrance of me."

In 1648 (132 Fairfax) the Rev. Thomas Nicolson of Stapleford-Tawney, Essex, first cousin of Bishop William Nicolson o Gloucester, bequeathed

" to Margaret Shearman, daughter of my brother William Nicolson, 20s. to buy her a ring with a death's head, which I intreat her to wear for my sake."

G. R. BBIGSTOCKE.


ORIGIN OF RIMES WANTED. Can any eader refer me to the origin of the following ?

" Is that the King that I see there ? I sa%y a nan at Bartlemy Fair looked more like a king han that man there."

Is there any more of it ? What was the date of it ? Was this part of an anti- nonarchical squib ?

I should also be glad to know where I can find the whole of a drinking-song referred

o in ' N.E.D.' (sub ' Nipperkin ')

" The old song which goes on with the gallon,

he pint, the half r>int, the nipperkin, and the

)rown bowl."

What was the date of it ? As far as I re- member, an extra vessel is added at the end of each verse. W. ROBERTS CROW.

' THE CITY NIGHT-CAP ' : ' PLUTUS. '- [ find these two plays advertised, with many others, in a bookseller's list, 1661. The full titles as given are " The City Night- cap, A Tragi-Comedy, by T. B. in 4 " ; " Plutus, A Comedy in 4." W^as this " T. B." Tony Brewer, who was the author of several popular plays of the period, or the " T. B." who was 'the author of ' Love will find out the Way,' a comedy printed in 1661 ? Thomas Bastard was the author of a tragedy published in 1652 called ' The Bastard.'*

The only plays with the title of ' Plutus ' which I can find, and both with different sub-titles, are (1) by Lewis Theobald, and published in 1715 ; and (2) by Henry Field- ing and " the Reverend Mr. Young," 1742. I should be glad to know the name of the author of the 1661 play. The bookseller prefaces his list of books and plays as follows :

" If any person please to repair to my shop at the Sign of John Fletcher's head, on the back side of St. Clement's without Temple-bar, they may be furnished with al Plays that were ever yet printed " ! WM ^ O RMAN.


" THE Six LORDS." Can any of your correspondents tell me who are " the Six Lords " who are commemorated as the sign of a public-house at Great Horwood, a village a little east of the town of Bucking- ham, on the road to Woburn ?

JOHN HORNER.

" AUSTRIA, THE CHINA OF EUROPE." According to a writer in The Daily Chronicle, the author of this witty saying was Disraeli ; if so, can somebody kindly supply the refer- ence ? I have often seen allusions to the Austrian aristocracy as " the Chinese of

  • Coxeter attributes this play to Cosmo Manuehe.