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PAPAL DESTRUCTION OF CLASSICAL MANUSCRIPTS.

Pope Gregory VII. is accused by Machiavel and by Cardan of destroying a manuscript of Varro, then extant in the library of the Vatican. The reason given for this illiberal conduct is as strange as the deed itself. The Pope, they say, having discovered that St. Augustine had made a very free use of the inedited part of that learned Roman's work, chose rather to burn the original than that his favourite polemic should be convicted of plagiarism. Several other classical manuscripts, having been confounded with that of Varro, are supposed to have perished by the same barbarous hand. Gregory, notwithstanding the conceited sanctity of his last words-"I have loved righteousness, and I have hated iniquity, therefore I die in exile," had been the most ambitious and imperious of prelates. He wrote to Henry the Fourth of Germany, "I wish I may perish if I do not deprive you of life and empire!" The people of Sardinia having hesitated as to paying the exactions of the Holy See, this meek servant of the servants of God threatened their extermination in these words, "I will stir up against you the Normans and the Lombards who shall waste your island with fire and sword." On another occasion, this same Pontiff expressed to his legate in Spain similar sentiments, "I had rather that the whole country were overrun by the Saracens, than possessed by wretched Christians who refuse homage to the Holy Church." He had proposed to unite all Christendom against the Saracens, but died at Salerno in 1087, after having kindled a lasting flame throughout Europe.

WAYSIDE CROSSES.

During a recent ramble in France, I observed frequently small crosses of wood, roughly fashioned, placed on the mound, at the foot of the wayside crosses. These, I concluded, were memorials or offerings deposited there by the worshippers from the adjacent villages, or, mayhap, by the passer by; if so, it appeared to me as being an interesting and peculiar custom among the many errors and superstitions of the Romish Church.

I should be glad to know if I am correct in my conjecture; and if not, to be set right. Torrington Square, Jan. 5.

RUSSIA SUBSIDIZED BY ENGLAND.

R. P.

Elizabeth Empress of Russia, by a Treaty in 1755, with King George II., was to receive, for ten years, a subsidy of 60,000l., during which time the Empress was to maintain, ready for the service of Great Britain, 73,450 men; it was further provided, that should they be actually employed in the field, the subsidy was to be augmented to 500,000l., per annum, but the troops were to be paid by Russia. What will the year 1955 produce?

SHAKESPEARE'S ARCHDEACON OF BANGOR.

A clever genealogist has lately been examining into my pedigree, which is one of the oldest of the Welsh descents, and collating it with others; and, amongst the rest, with that in Lewys Dwnn's Heraldic Visitation of Wales, in the time of Queen Elizabeth, and printed by that distinguished antiquary, Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick. He who is curious in such matters will find it in vol. II. page 290 (North Wales), and at the bottom of the left hand page, thus headed-Yr ach yma oedd yr gyntaf yn yr hến llyfr, i.e., This Pedigree was the first in the old Book. This pedigree, though incomplete, is one of the fullest and longest in the book. The lineal descent from Jestyn ap Gwrgant, King of Glamorgan, whose arms I bear; down to Davidd Vangor, i.e. David of Bangor, is clearly shewn, and is corroborated by old Welsh Manuscripts and other authorities. This David of Bangor, the Dean, is named by Browne Willis, David Daron; and, it is said, that in his house at Bangor, that scheme of resistance was concerted, which caused so much disquietude to King Henry the Fourth. It is also said, that my ancestor, David Daron, whose eldest son is styled Davidd Vilwr, i.e. David the soldier (he married Jane, daughter and heiress of Black David, the son of David Wynne, the son of Red Evan of Powys), was outlawed in 1406, for his complicity with Owain Glyndwr. He is, beyond all doubt, "the Archdeacon" of Shakespeare, in whose house Hotspur, Worcester, Mortimer, and Glendower meet. See First Part of King Henry the Fourth, Act III., sc. 1.

Shakespeare, it would seem, had erroneously styled him Archdeacon, or, he might have been Archdeacon, as well as Dean. If any of your antiquarian friends can and history of David Daron, the Dean; as well as upon throw light upon this matter, and upon the conduct the manner and term of his outlawry, they will confer a very great favour upon me. I am not a notorietymonger, and, at the same time, I have no wish for concealment. You are at liberty to make known to any gentleman desiring information, my name, and condition, or to send him a copy of my arms, etc. RICHARD AP DAVIDD DARON.

North Wales, Jan. 19.

Frederick the Great, while reviewing some troops, observed a soldier with the scar of a deep cut across the cheek. The king asked him, "At what ale-house did you get that scratch?" "At Cöslin, please your Majesty, where your Majesty paid the reckoning," was the prompt reply. How many are now in the same condition, but who has to pay the reckoning has yet to be seen?

The Fifth volume of Current Notes, with Index, in

extra cloth boards, uniform with the prior volumes; may now be had, price THREE SHILLINGS.

The present number being the commencement of a new year, Subscribers are respectfully reminded that their subE. PHILPOT, Lyme Regis, is respectfully referred to scription for the forthcoming twelve months which are now Current Notes, 1853, p. 90.

due, can be forwarded in Postage Stamps.

No. LXII.]

WILLIS'S CURRENT NOTES.

"Takes note of what is done-
By note, to give and to receive."-SHAKESPEARE.

SIR THOMAS OVERBURY, KNIGHT, ETAT. XXXII.

At a period when the public attention is arrested by the numerous accusations against individuals for having insidiously exercised their skill in dispensing deadly poisons to their kindred and wives; the case of Sir Thomas Overbury occurs to excite our most particular

The Trial of the Earl of Somerset, for the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury; edited by Andrew Amos, Esq., late member of the Supreme Council of India; Recorder of Nottingham, Oxford, and Banbury; Auditor and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, etc., with portraits, 8vo., pp. 552. The work recently published by Mr. Bentley, at FOURTEEN SHILLINGS, having become the property of Messrs. Willis and Sotheran, has been by them reduced in price to FOUR SHILLINGS AND SIXPENCE.

The woodcut is from a print engraved by Reginald Elstracke, shortly after Sir Thomas Overbury's death; it is of such extreme rarity, that at General Dowdeswell's sale, Sir Mark M. Sykes purchased an impression for fifty pounds. On the dispersion of the Sykes' collection, Woodburn was the buyer at seventy-four guineas.

VOL. VI.

[FEBRUARY, 1856.

observation, seeing that of all others, from the position of the murderers, the distinction of their characters, the malevolence of the conspiracy, and the range it was in purpose to have taken, it has no equal in history, neither before or since the perpetration of that diabolical deed.

The volume bearing the above title, embodies much that has not hitherto been printed, nor have the original papers been perused, or used by the historians of the reign of James the First, who seems to have been the presiding spirit of every bad quality, and by the subserviency of men, whose education should have embued them with more independence of character, many most disgraceful traits occur, simply from the reason to court his favour, and impose upon his weakness. The Howards of that day appear to have largely partaken of the royal patronage, and to have been utterly unworthy. The marriage of Lady Frances Howard with Robert D'Evreux, Earl of Essex; the bridegroom but fourteen years of age, and the bride not more than thirteen, has been celebrated in history by Ben Jonson's highly poetical espousal drama, the Masque of Hymen. This was the first characteristical event in a long series of incidents, all tending to an unexampled career of guilty enjoyment, magnificence, crime, and degradation. Her intrigues, young as she was, were continued in such a reckless course, that she seemed to be abandoned to all sense of shame. She intrigued with Prince Henry, and her general wantonness became so flagrant, that even he retired from her in disgust. As a woman thwarted in her object she appears to have breathed revenge, and according to the admission of Anne Turner, whose conduct was more memorable subsequently, the Prince was deprived of affording the Countess of Essex further provocation, by poisoned grapes at Wood

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Robert Carr, a countryman of King James, became the favourite of the monarch, and disgusting as in all particulars that connexion appears to have been, the Countess, and her uncle, Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton, recognised in him the means of their further advancement, no matter by what crimes it was achie ed, and these conspiracies would seem to have been contrived at the now Northumberland House, in the Strand.

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It was proposed to sue for a divorce between the Countess by the hands of Mrs. Turner, with the positive knowand the Earl of Essex, and to effect a marriage between ledge of Lord Rochester, and the connivance of the her and this satellite of kingly adoption-King James Governor Elwes. These poisons, however, operated but not only sanctioned the proceedings, but impatiently slowly, and Rochester, in his frequent visits to the urged them on, and dictated their final conclusion. The Countess of Essex at her lodgings in Whitehall, having Countess, notwithstanding the flagrancy of her conduct, access thereto by a straight long gallery from St. James's protested her innocence, and the jury of matrons who Park, frequently complained of the delay, and expressed were employed on the occasion were deluded by the sub- doubts whether Weston was not playing the knave, and stitution of the daughter of Sir Thomas Mounson, who forgetting to execute his part? The eight several being thickly veiled eluded the detection of her identity. poisons which were administered to Overbury, were first The divorce took place, but Overbury, who knew her given as a powder to renovate his health, and afterwards infamous bearings, and appears to have been the suc- introduced in jellies and tarts. Mayerne, the king's cessful director of Carr in his onward course, and to physician, was induced to send Overbury medicine, being have really entertained a true friendship for him, endea- | then, as stated, in a consumption, and to have been invoured in every possible way to prevent the marriage-nocently made the tool of the parties by commending one that has no equal on record, as having been followed as medical attendant, one Paul de Lobell, an apotheby consequences in which morality, law, and religion cary dwelling in Lime-street, near the Tower. This were so greatly outraged for the indulgence of guilty latter, for the sum of twenty pounds, administered a and impetuous passions. clyster, on Sept. 14th, that ended all anxieties Overbury was, by all the parties, considered as an on the part of the persons involved in the guilty transimpediment to the marriage-how to get rid of him was action. Sir Thomas Overbury, already prostrated by the subject of many consultations. It was proposed to the frequent appliance of the poison, which Weston involve him in a quarrel with one of the courtiers, and affirmed to have been sufficient to destroy twenty other thus obtain his imprisonment. There were none who men, was a mass of sores, and reduced to skin and bone, would quarrel with him, and the scheme failed. Sir expired about five o'clock in the morning of Wednesday, Davie Wood, in some proceeding, had sought Carr's Sept. 15, 1613, and was buried in the body of the choir interest, and he consented, provided Overbury should be of the church within the Tower, between three and four a sharer with him; this failed, and Sir Davie imbibed p.m. on that day. Rochester was created Earl of a hatred of Overbury, who he considered was the sole Somerset in November following, and their marriage took cause of his non-success. The Countess, aware of this place on St. Stephen's day, with unexampled pomp. ill-feeling, sought, under the promise of one thousand Murder may for a time be hidden from mortal ken, pounds, to induce Wood to effect Overbury's assassi- but some unforeseen circumstance generally uplifts the nation. Sir Davie accepted the terms, but required a veil, and discloses the villainy. The assertion that Sir surety from Lord Rochester of a pardon from the Thomas Overbury had been poisoned obtained sufficient king for the act; but as Carr could not ensure that notice, that the individuals concerned were at length instrument, Wood prudently declined proceeding. To charged with criminality, but not till after the death of poison Overbury was next determined, but the depriving the Earl of Northampton, he who had been the main him of liberty was essential to its accomplishment. contriver, and possibly suggested the poisons, and their Overbury was, by Carr's instigation, appointed to a mode of application. He died June 15, 1614, and ministerial appointment abroad; and he treacherously escaped a deservedly ignominious fate. Weston was induced Overbury to refuse it; for this, the latter was charged in the indictment with having administered to on April 21, 1613, committed "for contempt" to the Overbury certain poisons severally named, between Tower. Sir William Waad, the governor, was dismissed May 9 and September 14; this last was not proved, I under the pretext of unfitness, by having permitted the but Weston, Franklin, Elwes, and Anne Turner, all Lady Arabella Stuart a key to enlarge the limits of her perished by the hand of the hangman; their trials are range in the Tower; and succeeded by Sir Gervase embodied in this volume, and divulge astounding facts Elwes, who "bled" to the tune of 20001. for the place, besides a compliance with conduct required of him; and the gaoler, who had the care of Sir Thomas Overbury, was also moved to make way for Richard Weston, who had been by the Countess specially commended to that appointment. All this was accomplished in the brief space of fifteen days, and the poisoning was commenced on the 9th of May; all intercourse was denied to the unhappy victim of their vengeance, and the particulars detailed in the volume are most appalling. The poison was supplied by James Franklin, a physician, "then dwelling on the back side of the Exchange," and taken to the Countess by Anne Turner, the widow of "a Dr. Turner." From the Countess they passed to Weston,

* Through this same "straight long gallery" Charles the First passed to Whitehall on the morning of his execution, January 30, 1649.

The charge, though urged against Weston, was not estab-| lished, nor did Lobell, a Frenchman, appear in the affair ; the clyster was administered by Lobell's assistant, William Reeve, who was sent to Paris immediately afterwards, by Lobell, senior, to be out of reach of enquiry, and the fact transpired years after, on the confession of Reeve. Their satiety in Overbury's blood was not sufficient for their resentment. Franklin and Turner, both spoke of other persons who were to have been poisoned by the instigation of the Earl and Countess; among them were the Princess Elizabeth and the Palsgrave Frederic.

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as to their depravity of character, and the condition to which each had been brought by the gold and chicanery of both the Earl and the Countess.

At length the Countess was tried on May 24, 1616, she pleaded guilty, but hoped for mercy; and being pregnant, had determined not to perish on the scaffold, but to accomplish her own death by the placing of a wet towel upon the abdomen after being delivered of the infant. The Earl was tried on the following day, but denied all; his peers, however, found him guilty. James, who had sworn to pardon no one implicated in the affair, yet pardoned them; the new favorite, George Villiers, extinguished every idea of Somerset's return to favour, and he lived unpitied and contemned.

At the present time, the Great Oyer of Poisoning possesses unusual importance. The evidence in all these cases has been legally investigated; the asserted great luminaries of the law, Coke and Bacon, in their characters, are here shewn to be contemptible parasites, the minions of a base monarch, and to have entertained few higher sentiments, or notions of honour, than their own advantage. The evidence of opinion, and every matter, that has arisen in other cases of atrocity, particularly those of poisoning, are all here carefully canvassed and considered. Documents, highly important, and unpublished, discovered in the State Paper Office, enrich the materials in profusion, and are edited with an aptitude that increases their value.

CAMOENS.-The newspapers notice the death of Sir Thomas Livingston Mitchell, D.C.L., Surveyor-General of New South Wales, at Sydney, on the 5th of October last, aged 64. He had held this appointment for more than a quarter of a century; and the inhabitants testified their respect for him by a public funeral.

When, in 1853, he came to England for the last time, he brought with him, for publication, a translation of the whole of the Lusiad of Camoens. He had served in his youth, it appears, in the Peninsula, and was inspired with an ardent love for the poetry of Camoens, in consequence of an accidental visit to the celebrated Fount of Tears, in the vicinity of Coimbra, the scene of the murder of Dona Ignez de Castro. In the preface, we are told, the translation was made in a small clipper, during a long and tedious voyage round Cape Horn. E. H. A.

George Weare Braikenridge, Esq., F.S.A. and F.G.S., of Broomwell House, Brislington, near Bristol, died after a few days illness, on the 11th inst., in his eighty-first year. His collections for the History and Topography of the County of Somerset, are of the most varied, extensive, and valuable character.

This infant was subsequently Anne, Countess of Bedford, and mother of Lord William Russell, who expiated his hatred of the Stuarts by his execution in Lincoln's-InnFields. Qu. Was the infant daughter of Somerset named Anne in compliment to the Queen of James the First?

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The woodcut represents the ruins of the chapel at Cape Cornwall; the two walls on the north side, and the east end. The doorway, like that of Madron Well Chapel, is on the northern side: it is two feet wide, and five feet high; and near the east end of the same wall, is a small window, two feet wide.

In the east end, which is between six and seven feet high, is a comparatively large window, measuring on the inside six feet in width; but it is less on the outside. The eastern part of the side, as seen in the woodcut, was faced with hewn stone, no doubt denoting the length of the chancel. On the south side all that remains is the foundation. A modern building for cattle has been erected at the extremity of the northern wall, and on my last visit to the spot, I found the eastern part of the chapel covered in, and used for a similar purpose.

Externally, the length of the building is thirty-two feet, the width twelve feet. On the north side are remains of a wall which seems to have formed a circular enclosure around the chapel; this was the chapel-yard, and it is remarkable that the boundary wall of Madron Well Chapel was of a similar form.

This building has been called or known as St. Helen's Oratory; and in a water course near the ruins was found a small cross, supposed to have been the gable cross that formerly pertained to this structure; it has since been placed in the chancel of St. Just church.* Penzance, Feb. 14.

J. T. BLIGHT.

The Rev. J. Buller, in his Account of St. Just's parish, 1842, p. 45, alludes to this discovery in these words:

The cross which once embellished the little chapel is of the rudest form, and was rescued a few years since by him who records the fact, from the artificial water-course which passes near, in which it was immersed.

It may now be seen preserved as a valuable relic in the chancel of the parish church, with a brass-plate denoting its ancient locality.

PARC-AN-CHAPEL, CAPE CORNWALL. The warlike tribes which in the earliest period of her history occupied Britain, appear to have seized on every spot of vantage ground to construct places of defence. In many instances portions of the cliffs on the sea coast, accessible only on the land side, were by them converted into strongholds, by artificial fortifications in that direction. The bold promontory of Cape Cornwall affords an example of this kind of fortress, or cliff castle. Three parallel lines were constructed across the low neck of land by which it is approached; each had its ditch and rampart; and was extended from cliff to cliff on either side. Between these lines some very old enclosures have been made, and the land cultivated; the spade and the mattock have indeed, year after year, been so busy with the old fortifications, that the casual visitor may pass through without observing them; but he cannot well fail to see among these enclosures, a low roofless ruin, which on inspection will be found to have been erected with a considerable degree of care, at a distant period. The quoins and courses of the eastern portion of the building are of well cut granite; and in the eastern gable are the remains of a comparatively large window, which in its internal display exhibits some fine proportions.

The entrance to this ruin is by an arched doorway in the north wall, near the western end, and facing the Bristol Channel, or, if you like it-the Irish Sea.

On the south side, near the western end, and in close connection, is another building that appears to have been erected at the same time. This, within a few years, has been neatly roofed over with slate, and is used for the purposes of an outbuilding to the little farm there. A small and rude enclosure nearly encircles the ruin. If the tenant, who lives in the cottage hard by, or any of his family who may happen to be working on the land, are asked the name of this spot, the enquirer will be told-Parc-an-Chapel, or the Chapel in the Field. He may also hear, that whilst the church at St. Just was some years since being restored under the inspection of the Rev. J. Buller, then vicar, he caused to be conveyed thither from this locality, a cross that belonged to the chapel.

I cannot undertake to say there may not have been another Parc-an-Chapel hereabouts, and now destroyed; or, that I may have been misinformed as to the name of the ruin here described; but as a ruin, I believe, it is

still extant.

H. A. C.

Exon, February 1. LETTER SEALS.-What is the surest method of sealing letters, so that they may not be opened in transitu? Ryde, Isle of Wight, Feb. 11. A. F. T.

No more effective security for sealed letters has been devised than simply using a wafer to a non-adhesive envelope, and then applying a thin layer of the finest sealing wax. This impressed with the seal bids defiance to their being opened without shewing the attempted violation. The wax not to extend beyond the size of the seal. The application of heat or steam will only harden the wafer.

MADRON BAPTISTERY AND WELL.

Some additional particulars respecting Madron Well, with a detailed account of the rites observed by those who sought its healing waters, are given in Observations on an Ancient Manuscript, entitled Passio Christi, written in the Cornish language, and now in the Bodleian Library; with an account of the Language, Manners, and Customs of the people of Cornwall, by William Scawen, Esq., Vice-Warden of the Stannaries. The paper will be found in Davies Gilbert's Parochial History of Cornwall, Vol. IV. p. 190. The writer lived in the Stuart reigns, and was a prisoner under Shrubsall, the Parliamentarian Governor of Pendennis Castle. Bodmin, February 6, THOMAS Q. COUCH.

Of St. Mardren's Well, (which is a parish west to the Mount) a fresh true story of two persons, both of them lame and decrepit, thus recovered from their infirmity. These two persons, after they had applied themselves to divers physicians and chirurgeons for cure, and finding no success by them, they resorted to St. Mardren's Well, and according to the ancient custom, of which they had heard, the same which was once in a year, to wit, on Corpus there, and to lie on the ground all night, drink of the Christi evening, to lay some small offering on the altar water there, and in the morning after, to take a good

draught more, and to take and carry away some of the water each of them in a bottle, at their departure. This course these two men followed, and within three weeks they found the effect of it, and by degrees their strength increasing, were able to move themselves on crutches. The year following, they took the same course, after which they were able to go with the help of a stick; and at length one of them, John Thomas, being a fisherman, was, and is able at this day, to follow his fishing craft. other, whose name was William Cork, was a soldier under (as he has often told me) was able to perform his duty, and the command of my kinsman, Colonel William Godolphin, died in the service of his majesty, King Charles the First.

The

But herewith take also this: one Mr. Hutchins, a person well known in those parts, and now lately dead, being parson of Ludgvan, a near neighbouring parish to St. Mardren's Well, he observing that many of his parishioners often frequented this well superstitiously, for which he reproved them privately, and sometimes publicly in his sermons; but afterwards, he the said Mr. Hutchins, meeting with a woman coming from the well with a bottle thereof, being then troubled with cholical pains, which in her hand, desired her earnestly that he might drink accordingly he did, and was eased of his infirmity.

The latter story is a full confutation of the former for if the taking the water accidentally thus prevailed upon the party to his cure, as it is likely it did, then the miracle the ground and offering, is wholly fled, and it leaves the which it was intended to be by the ceremony of lying on

And

virtue of the water to be the true cause of the cure. we have here, as in many places of the land, great variety of salutary springs, having diversity of operations, which by natural reason have been found to be productive of good effects, and not by miracle, as the vain fancies of monks and friars have been exercised in heretofore.

Schiller's works are prohibited by the Austro-Italian bishops.

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