"Germany, England, and Scotland; or, Recollections of a Swiss Minister. By J. H. Merle d'Aubigné, D.D. London, 8vo, 1848."

There are doubtless many intervening publications, but the next in date on my own shelves is the able and liberal work:

"De l'Avenir Politique de l'Angleterre. Par le Comte

de Montalembert. 8vo. Paris, 1856."

A translation was published by Murray, 8vo,

1856, and this was reviewed in The Times of March 27, in the same year.

This is a book which every Englishman should read and reread; following it up with the celebrated

"Débat sur l'Inde au Parlement Anglais. London (Jeffs), 8vo, 1858,"

or the authorised translation into English of the same, from the Correspondent of Oct. 29, 1858, published also by Jeffs, price 18.

Though the book is flippant, querulous, and unfair, with some very ridiculous stories and blunders, the small sum of one frane will not be misspent in the purchase of

"Les Anglais chez eux. Par Francis Wey. Paris, Michel Lévy Frères. 8vo. 1856.”

Any sum, however, would be too dear for the stupid work of Ledru-Rollin on the Décadence de l'Angleterre, even on the old principle "Fas est et ab hoste doceri."

Another recent book of similar title, but much more genial tone and philosophic spirit, is the work of M. Alphonse Esquiroz, of which the English translation is entitled "The English at Home. 3 vols. 12mo. 1861."

The original papers of this enlightened and liberal observer, under the head of "L'Angleterre et la Vie Anglaise," date their commencement from the Revue des Deux Mondes, 1857 (tome onzième, p. 367), and will be found continued in the succeeding volumes almost down to the present day. As there are no more minute and elaborate, so there probably exist no more valuable studies on our national life and character thau those of M. Esquiroz. He is not one of those who think that a period of "quinze jours," or even of "six mois," passed in the immediate purlieus of Leicester Square, would qualify him to write on the subject he has chosen. Aware of its complex structure and myriform aspects, he has prepared himself, by earnest and conscientious study, and

has noted the results in a liberal and truthful

spirit. In a word, he has begun where others have, or should have, ended-with a recognition of the truth which will be forced on the conviction of the reader of the generality of books on the same subject, and with the enunciation of which M. Esquiroz commences his papers: "Rien n'est plus facile que d'écrire sur l'Angleterre, rien n'est plus difficile que de la connaître."

I have reserved for the last, as indeed its date demands, a notice of a very charming book, which differs from the others I have mentioned in

treating of country and provincial, rather than the metropolitan life of England, which latter, in the great majority of cases, naturally engrosses the entire attention of the French visitor, as being, in his judgment, the sole worthy of study and comEngland. This book is entitled memoration. With us, however, London is not

"Vie de village en Angleterre; ou Souvenirs d'un Exilé. Par l'auteur de l'Etude sur Channing. Paris.

8vo, 1862.”

I perceive-I may just add in conclusion-that the third volume has just appeared of the last work of the illustrious Montalembert, The History of the Monks of the West. This is noticed in the Paris correspondent's letter in The Times of Dec. 3, where will be found an elegant and spirited translation of the opening passage, which forms

a brilliant and eloquent eulogy on the British nation. WILLIAM BATES.

Birmingham.

Some few years ago a very interesting series of papers appeared in the Revue des Deux Mondes on Holland, which I read with great pleasure, but I cannot answer for the feelings of a Dutchman. This was succeeded by articles on England by the same writer who had previously fascinated me; but, although there was the same sparkling pen, there was an entire absence of the breadth of

mind exhibited in his "Holland." Both works, after being separately published in Paris, were translated into English; and a second volume, on the English also, subsequently made its appearance in English, apparently intended to atone to Englishmen for some of the absurdities which gratified his French countrymen in the first volume. Such "Revues" are, like Pindar's razors, made to sell and not to shave. The writer appears to have taken up his residence in the vicinity of our Crystal Palace, and to have stepped out first thing on the Gypsies of Norwood: for a large portion of his first, and, according to his original design, only volume, is taken up with a description of this vagabond class as autochthones and peculiarly and specially English, as if no such people existed in France or any other part of the world. He finds many charms in Gypsy women, and assures his readers that they are to be found amongst the wealthy and noble families of England; but he cunningly remarks, it is difficult to recognise them after exaltation from their original habitat. One he mentions as prima donna at the St. Petersburgh opera-house. Such descriptions of the English have a sale amongst Frenchmen, who, like the rest of the world, prefer to have their prejudices flattered rather than to learn the truth. Other French works might be mentioned descriptive of the English, some of which have been reviewed by the Quarterly and Edinburgh, and which are still more absurd. These are the successors to the great French authors of the last century, who appear to have had a better knowledge of the English, with more candour and good T. J. BUCKTON.

sense.

Streatham Place, S.

Many celebrated Frenchmen (including Guizot, Louis Blanc, Montalembert) have, within these few years, written works upon us and our doings. The papers by Esquiros, however (first published in the Revue des Deux Mondes), hold deservedly the first place. They are translated, and the translations are to be had at almost every library. NOELL RADECLIFFE.

CHAPLAINS TO THE LORDS SPIRITUAL AND TEMPORAL, JUDGES OF THE HIGH COURTS, AND OTHER PUBLIC FUNCTIONARIES.

(3rd S. x. 414.)

The nominations and appointments of chaplains to the royal family, peers of the realm, &c., are, with the privilege attached, derived from and dependent upon three Acts of Parliament passed in the reign of King Henry VIII., viz. :

1st. Act the 21st Henry VIII. c. 13, entitled "Spiritual Persons abridged from having Pluralities of Livings, and from taking of Fermes." The chief object of this Act was to restrain the holding of pluralities by spiritual persons, and defines the extent to which they might take and hold lands to farm or otherwise, and what religious houses, masters of colleges and hospitals, might keep demesne lands in their hands for the maintenance of their houses.

There are, as was generally the case, exceptions provided for, and privileges granted to some class or other exclusively.

By sect. 13 persons are named in whose favour exception is made in regard to their privilege of purchasing licences or dispensations to have and hold more benefices than one, viz. :

All Spiritual Men of the King's Council to take and keep three benefices with cure of souls.

notwithstanding their remarriage with husbands under the degree of a Baron as before limited to the m being Widows, and such Chaplain to have same privilege of holding 2 Benetices.

2nd. Act the 25th Henry VIII. c. 16, entitled "An Act that every Judge of the High Courts may have one Chaplain beneficed with Cure."

Which Act cites 21 Henry VIII. c. 13, in which it is stated that no provision was made for any of the king's judges of his high courts, commonly called the King's Bench and Common Pleas, except only for the Chief Judge of the King's Bench, nor for the Chancellor, nor Chief Baron of the King's Exchequer, nor for any other inferior persons being of the King's most Honourable Council; and therefore it was enacted that —

1

And each hold 1 Benefice.

3rd. Act the 33rd Henry VIII. c. 28, entitled "An Act for the Chancellor of the Duchy

of Lancaster and others."

Which Act recites that of 21 Henry VIII. c. 13, wherein no provision was made for any of the head officers of the king's several courts of the Duchy of Lancaster, the Courts of Augmentations of the Revenues of the Crown, the First Fruits and Tenths, the Master of the Court of Wards and Liveries, the General Surveyor of Crown Lands, and other of the king's courts. It was thereby enacted that

The Chancellor of the Court of the Duchy of Lancaster.
Chancellor of the Court of Augmentations.
Chancellor of the Court of First Fruits and Tenths.
Master of the King's Wards and Liveries.
General Surveyor of the Crown Lands.

99

honorary) there is no stamp upon the appoint

ment.

In a list kept at the Faculty Office of the persons entitled to appoint chaplains, there occurs the following not named in the statute of the 21st Henry VIII., viz:

Secretary of State.*

Clerk of the Closet.

--

Widow of Clerk of the Closet: though she marry, that doth not take off qualification.

The Faculty List doth not appear to take notice of various other persons or officers named in the Acts of the 25th or 33rd of Henry VIII., although it includes two not named in the Act of the 21st or either of the others.

A note appended to the Faculty Office List says, that a peer being a Knight of the Garter may appoint three in addition to his peerage number.

This Act of the 21st Henry VIII. was enforced by the 25th Henry VIII. c. 21, s. 21, which was repealed by 1 & 2 Philip and Mary.

The Act of the 25th Henry VIII. was repealed by 1 & 2 Philip and Mary c. 8; and by s. 27 of the same Act that part of the statute of the 21st Henry VIII. recited in s. 3 is repealed by s. 4. The statute of 1 & 2 Philip and Mary is repealed by 1 & 2 Eliz. c. 1, except in such branches and clauses as therein excepted.

By the 8th and 10th sections the Act of the 25th Henry VIII. is re-enacted and revived; but by 26 & 27 Vict. this Act was again repealed.

There are several enactments which seem to affect this question, viz.: 57th Geo. III. c. 99; 1 & 2 Vict. c. 106, amended by 13 & 14 Vict. Vict. c. 142; 26 & 27 Vict. c. 125. c. 98; 18 & 19 Vict. c. 127, extended by 23 & 24

cult to say what remains of the original statute of Considering these various statutes, it is diffithe 21st Henry VIII. The privileges it conferred are clearly annihilated in regard to holding pluralities. That of the 25th Henry VIII., by which Henry VIII. extended to them, is repealed in toto; the judges had the benefit of the Act of the 21st so that it may be asked under what authority do the Lords Temporal in Parliament, the Judges, and other public functionaries appoint chaplains unless under some common-law right existing previous to the statute of the 21st Henry VIII. ? and from a passage in Lord Coke's report of Acton's case, 45 Eliz., it would appear that a common-law right did exist before the statute of 21 Henry VIII. See Coke's Reports, ii. 117.

J. R.

The Act provides for the "King's Secretary." There are now four Secretaries of State, equally the King's Secretaries.

The Gentleman's Magazine of the last century supplied the place of the "N. & Q." of our more favoured day. In its volumes for 1793, 1794, 1797, and 1799, the subject of "Roundels" attracted much attention; and in p. 458, of the volume for 1799, Mr. John Fenton, of Fishguard, quotes the second of the four stanzas given by MR. PIGGOT, JUN. (p. 472 above), and supplies a sketch of the beechen plate on which it was painted, speaking of it as "one of a set in the possession of a young antiquary," and that he can trace them back to Queen Elizabeth's time." Should this "young antiquary of 1799 be the same with Richard Fenton, F.S.A. (also of Fishguard), author of An Historical Tour through Pembrokeshire, they may have found their way from his collection to the Bodleian Library; and a comparison of the engraving with the specimens there might possibly establish their identity, and in such case would account for MR. PIGGOT's perhaps only conjectural assertion that the set had belonged to Queen Elizabeth. MR. PIGGOT assumes that they were fruit trenchers; but this was the great subject of discussion, and although one correspondent, as I shall show, calls them "trenchers for cheese or sweetmeats," the general opinion seemed to be that they were used in some game, or as conversation cards; and their limited size (5 to 5 inches), their thinness, and their perfect flatness, would seem to encourage this opinion; which opinion appears equally to have prevailed among your various correspondents in "N. & Q.," vol. xi., as referred to above.

Having thus taken advantage of MR. PIGGOT's note to reopen the subject as one of interest, and in the hope that during the last ten years some further specimens may have been discovered and some new light thrown on their history, I should like permission to give a condensed summary of what was said by Mr. Urban's friends, except where they have already been alluded to in "N. & Q."—such as in the first recorded case, in the volume for 1793 (p. 398), which has been described in your vol. xi. p. 267-merely adding that they are spoken of as being very thin, flat, and appearing to be as old as the time of Henry VII. or Henry VIII., and of which the facsimile engravings given are really very curious.

At pp. 1187-8, Part II. of the same volume (1793), there are three communications describing different sets. The first, consisting of than ten," had been found "walled up in a farmhouse, which had been a religious house," at St. Leonard's in Bedford: "Some were finely painted and gilt, and these had each some religious sentence on them, and verses, if I remember right, not

very fit to accompany it. . . . Some were plain
beech without letters, paint, or other ornament.
They were thought to have been used for diversion,
as some game.' The same writer (M.) then de-
scribes another set of twelve, in the possession of
"Mr. Drew of this place (Bedford), stone-mason.
They are flat beechen plates in a rudely
painted box; and seem designed, like the others,
for some game, as was indeed asserted by the per-
son from whom they originally came in Stafford-
shire. . . where they really were played as a
game, but in what manner he cannot tell." These,
it appears, "were not painted, but consisted of
prints, coloured, and pasted on the beech-wood,
which is plain on one side." Each plate had one
of the signs of the zodiac, and the legend sur-
rounded a centre subject, generally of a grotesque
character; and two are selected as being without
improper levity, one of which is as follows:-
"Disguised thus at Candlemas we come;

With gambols, dice and cards, we mask and mumm;
Some loseth all, and some the money purses;
Some laugh outright, whilst others sweares and curses.'

The next writer (S. E., p. 1188) alludes to one, upon which had been written by Mr. Ives, the Yarmouth antiquary, that it was a trencher for James I. S. E. does not acquiesce in this opinion, cheese or sweetmeats, used about the time of but considers them "fortune-telling cards" of Henry VIII.'s time. His sample is this:—

"To spende over muche be not to bolde,

Abate rather somewhatt yi (thy) householde:
For of thy landes bothe fare and nere,

To the (the) smale frutes will come this yere."

The third writer (T. P.) gives a lively account of the use of a set of these roundels "for telling fortunes, being held in the hand spread out as cards," which he witnessed, forty years before, at the house of "the old lady Vicountess Longueville at her seat at Brandon, three miles from Coventry."

In vol. xiv. for 1794, P. P. describes eight, part of a supposed set of twelve, as having each a massive gilt circle enclosing a curious group of figures in gold, red, yellow, &c.-such as hearts, true lovers' knots, crescents, wheels, dots, butterflies, caterpillars, fishes, leaves, roses and other flowers not quite so easily named, diversely expressed on different roundels." He then transcribes the verses in the centre of each, "in hopes of meeting with a satisfactory explanation of their use." Three out of the eight will serve as specimens of this lot: --

1. "Thy fooes mutche grieffe to the have wrought,
And thy destruction have they soughte."

4. "Truste nott this worlde thou wooeful wighte,
Butt lett thy ende be in thye sighte."

8. "Thy youthe in follie thon haste spente,
Defere not nowe for to repente."

"Deface me not, nor with disgrace doe sticke me, Though I am sweete, bryers have power to pricke ye." An anonymous writer then, at p. 409, gives a specimen from a MS. set of "Posyes for Trenchers," written near the beginning of the previous century, as follows:

"Who dare buye first a pretious Pearle
Must be as great as anye earle :

If he has worthe, let him not feare,

The Jewell cannot be too deare."

And adds, of the other eleven, that, "although highly witty, they too closely border on indecency."

At length, in 1797 (vol. lxvii. p. 281), a then frequent correspondent, signing himself "W. and D., sums up the whole matter in favour of the trencher theory: his opinion being, apparently, chiefly founded upon a curious passage from the Art of English Poesie, attributed to Puttenham, and published by Richard Field in 1589. For this 1 must refer to the volume of the magazine, which I have not now with me; believing that these extracts from the Gentleman's Magazine, and the references in your own pages eleven years ago, thus brought into one view, will suffice to help to elucidate a very curious subject, especially if they should conduce to the discovery of further and perhaps contemporary allusions to the use and purpose of these roundels.

St. John's Wood.

S. II. HARLOWE.

DUTCH BALLAD.

(3rd S. x. 303.)

dation, illustrating as it does in a remarkable This morceau is worthy of a little further elucidegree the original identity of the NiederDeutsch of the Continent with our own mother tongue. The date is probably of the twelfth, or beginning of the thirteenth century, a period when the indigenous structure and vocabulary of the Anglo-Saxon was fast wearing down, and passing into early English The Biblical paraphrase of Ormin, commonly called the Ormulum, is of about the same date or a little later. Its language is that of rugged early English, rather than Saxon or semi-Saxon, yet I believe nearly every word in the Dutch ballad which has disappeared from our own tongue will be found in the Ormulum. In fact, every word in the ballad is common both to Dutch and English, and the syntax is the same in both. The spelling differs, but that is of small consequence. In order to exhibit this identity I give the old Dutch version with the English equivalent verbatim in parallel lines, marking in italics those words which have fallen out of use, but which are nevertheless sound English of the olden time. In some words which are not obsolete I have preserved the final extra syllable, and in others the old final e, to accommodate the rhythm.