Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

The Fairford windows are fortunately open to comparison. They may be very advantageously compared with a still more extensive, and in many respects even superior, series of painted glass in the celebrated windows of King's College chapel, Cambridge. Of that magnificent collection of historical compositions, only the great east window is extensively known. It has been engraved, and may frequently be met with in the rooms of Cambridge scholars. But the rest, the side windows, although of very great artistic value, are much less thought about. They are arranged in a continuous series of types and antetypes (with figures of prophets and messengers between them: a system which is only partially carried out in the Fairford glass.

The east window of Fairford church representing the Crucifixion, with five smaller subjects below it, exhibits the same subject as the great window of King's College chapel, Cambridge. There is great similarity between them. In one respect, at least, Fairford has a considerable advantage over the glass at Cambridge, which consists in the very fine west window of the Last Judgment. The subject is entirely wanting in the University series; although it would, doubtless, have appeared in the great west window, which still continues blank with plain glass, had the original designs been fully carried out.

The west window, containing the Last Judgment, appears to me to be of an earlier date than the rest of the glass at Fairford. It is especially interesting as exhibiting a close affinity to the frequently described picture at Dantzig-a large altarpiece of the Last Judgment, formerly attributed to Ouwater, and subsequently by Dr. Waagen to Hans Memling. The picture is certainly a highly important picture of the Flemish school. The arrangement and general action of the figures, the blessed ascending steps with the aid of St. Peter, and the violent action of the condemned on the opposite side, are common to both paintings. At Dantzig, the figures of the blessed entering Paradise are entirely nude; whilst at Fairford, their habiliments, tiaras, mitres, and crowns, distinguish their former grades and positions in life. At Fairford, the condemned are much more grotesque; and the demons are scaly, with snouts, hideously formed limbs, such as beset St. Anthony in Martin Schongauer's well-known engraving. A remarkable parallel exists also in the central and dignified figure of St. Michael, holding the scales in one hand and a processional cross in the other. He is fully armed, and the fashion of the armour in both instances belongs to the fifteenth century. My lamented friend C. Winston thought very highly of this window, and I quite concur in the views which he expressed of the Fairford series in his Inquiry into Ancient Glass-paintings, p. 114 of the first edition.

My principal object, however, in now writing, must not be forgotten; which is to invite attention, concurrently with that of Fairford, to the fine and extensive series of glass-paintings in King's College chapel. A very learned and thoroughly practical paper on the latter series was printed by the Rev. W. J. Bolton, in No. 46 of the Journal of the Archæological Institute, to which I contributed two supplemental papers printed in Nos. 48 and 49 of the same journal. They appeared respectively in December 1855 and March 1856.

The Fairford windows at that time interested me deeply, and it was my wish to study them as completely as possible. I went so far as to read a paper upon them, illustrated with original drawings made by a very clever amateur, at the April meeting of the Archæological Institute, 1856; but delayed committing it to press in the desire to go more fully into the subject, and to produce something much more elaborate. My subsequent occupations and engagements have taken a very different turn; but now I rejoice to find that the Fairford windows are engaging so much of public attention, and to observe by an announcement in some of the public papers that a fitting memorial of them is likely to be secured by the united labours of a committee of savans convened for the special purpose.

G. S.

Having access to several German works that seem to treat exhaustively of Albert Dürer's life, and of his vast body of compositions, I have looked into them with great curiosity to discover if any decisive mention is made of Dürer as a painter on glass, but without success. Gessert, in his Geschichte der Glasmalerei (Stuttgart, 1839), states that—

"neither from any notices on Dürer's part, or by his contemporaries, or from modern works, which treat of actually painted on glass. That he was reckoned among his life and art, can any certainty be arrived at that he

the masters of our art appears, however, from this-that he experimented, with German industry, in the most varied branches of art, and therefore could scarcely have wholly abstained from glass-painting, which at his time was flourishing in its utmost glory. Besides, in the takeable style of this master has led to the opinion that drawing (or design) of many glass-paintings, the unmishe completed them in all their parts; while, perhaps, he only supplied the carton-an assistance which the most distinguished artists of that period did not disdain to give."-P. 135.

In the copious article on Dürer inserted in the very valuable and beautifully-illustrated Conversations-Lexicon für bildende Kunst, 3 Band, Leipzig, 1846 (a work, unfortunately, never completed), the writer, in summing up the beneficial

* Will no great publisher, Brockhaus or Cotta, come forward to complete so invaluable a boon to the fine arts as this work would be in its perfect state?

influence of Dürer on all branches of the fine arts, states it to have been unbounded; and enumerates in particular its effects on painters in oil, in miniature, in enamel, on glass; on engravers, formcutters, and even on sculptors, goldsmiths, diecutters, and lithographers. This far-spread and powerful influence the writer attributes to Dürer's skill and mastery in design.

Connected with Gessert's work, I may here incidentally be permitted to mention that, more than twenty-five years ago, I assisted in completing a translation of it for a well-known amateur and patron of the fine arts in this city, Mr. T. Combe; but by some strange mischance, the MS. was lost when about to be sent to the press, and has never since been heard of. The loss was the more to be regretted on account of numerous notes and additions to the work kindly contributed by an eminent scholar and art-critic, then a student, and now the Dean of Christ Church. With regard to the Fairford windows, Gessert merely repeats the common accounts given of them by Dallaway in his Anecdotes of the Arts in England. In an enumeration given in the Conversations-Lexicon of the glass-paintings to be found in Nürnberg (Dürer's native city), not one is mentioned as by him; but several, by modern artists, are stated to be after the great master: J. MACRAY. Oxford.

Just now that these windows are attracting much attention, it may be interesting to see what has been said of them by an early writer, Richard Corbet, D.D., 1582-1635. The following poem may be considered to escape the charge either of profanity or immodesty :

"UPON FAIREFORD WINDOWES.
Tell me, you Anti-Saints, why Brass
With you is shorter-liv'd than Glass?
And why the Saints have scap'd their Falls
Better from Windows than from Walls?
Is it because the Brethren's Fires
Maintain a Glass-house at Black-Fryers?
Next which the Church stands North and South,
And East and West the Preacher's mouth.
Or is't because such Painted Ware
Resembles something that you are,
So py'de, so seeming, so unsound

In Manners and in Doctrine found,

That, out of Emblematick Wit,

You Spare your selves in Sparing it?

If it be so, then Fairford, boast

Thy Church hath Kept what all have Lost,
And is Preserved from the bane

Of either War or Puritane,

Whose Life is colour'd in thy Paint,
The inside Dross, the outside Saint."
Poems, written by Dr. Richard Corbet, the Third
Edition, 1672, p. 111.

Yaxley.

W. H. S.

BISHOP PERCY AND HIS "RELIQUES." My personal recollections of the bishop are about sixty-five years old, but I distinctly bear in mind his appearance as a venerable-looking man, with a placid countenance and regular features, dressed in black, and wearing an apron, which last particularly struck me.

I was reading Ovid or Virgil with my father, who superintended my education, when Dr. Percy was rather suddenly announced. Seeing how I was engaged, after greeting my father, he encouragingly held out his hand to me, which of course I took, and never having been so familiar with a bishop before, it made an impression upon me. What particularly passed in conversation I do not remember, but my mother, who also knew Dr. Percy, was sent for and came. My belief is that the acquaintance between Percy and my father began when the former was Dean of Carlisle; who, coming to see Dr. Vincent, then Master of Westminster School, extended his walk (for I recollect no carriage) some hundred or two of yards to call upon a person whom he had known a good many years before. He was attended by a servant, and this servant had in his care a copy of the Reliques of the edition of 1775 (by mistake I gave the date as 1774 in my former communication), which Dr. Percy presented to my father. That very copy now lies before me, and it is remarkable chiefly for the omission of the ballad "The Wanton Wife of Bath." I have seen it stated that this so-called questionable production was left out of the second edition of the Reliques in 1767; but such is not the fact, for it is found on p. 145 of the third volume of that impression with a brief introduction (as in the edition of 1765) containing merely Addison's recommendation of it. Why Percy presented to my father the third edition instead of the fourth (which had come out in 1794, as superintended by his nephew) I know not, while I can easily understand why he did not give him the first or the second.

The interview did not last long, but my father went out with the bishop, and did not return for some time; and my lessons, I think, were ended for that day. Of the subjects talked about I have no trace, but it must have been winter time, and the House of Lords then sitting, for Dr. Percy had come from thence to visit Dr. Vincent. I am not aware that his acquaintance with the learned author of The Voyage of Nearchus has ever been mentioned. Through "the Poets' Corner," in Westminster Abbey, was the nearest way to Dr. Vincent's and my father's, and I have some notion that the bishop stated that he had come that road, and that he had derived pleasure from association. What he said—if he said anythingabout his Reliques has entirely escaped me. Having another copy, my father never allowed that then presented to him to be used in the family, and it is

now precisely in its original state-bound only in sheep-skin, gilt, which in course of time has somewhat decayed, but there is not a speck, blemish, or even crumple of any kind within the covers. This work first encouraged my taste for our old popular poetry.

Many years ago I knew an old clergyman who had resided and done duty in a parish near Dromore. He told me that the bishop's mode of life, as I could well suppose, was extremely simple and unpretending, while at the same time he kept up his rank and state in his diocese very becomingly, and even somewhat austerely. He was charitable, but with due discrimination; very attentive to the educational wants of his poor neighbours, while Mrs. Percy, as her health allowed it, was a frequent visitor among them. I asked whether Dr. Percy seemed to feel with any acuteness the severity of Ritson's attacks upon him. So little so, that my informant had never even heard of them at Dromore. As far as he knew, the bishop's studies, in the beginning of this century, were entirely theological and devotional, but he did not preach very often: his style in the pulpit was slow and plain, but impressive. He was generally supposed in Ireland to be a distant relative of the dukes of Northumberland.

"MORNING SPRING-SONG.
"Walking, lady, let us go:
See the sun-shine all a-glow!
Hark! and hear the joyous birds
Singing descant without words.
The thrush upon the tallest tree.
Knocks it loud and lustily.
"Some are in the air so high
You might think them of the sky;

These, indeed, you cannot see,
Though they sing so merrily:
You may hear them for a mile,
Whilst both earth and heaven smile.
"Then, behold the greeny grass
Kiss your footsteps as you pass.

See the daisy's open eye
Peering upward cunningly,
To behold what it may view:
Would I were a daisy too!
"See also the hawthorn blossom,
The dog-rose on nature's bosom :

Can there be a sweeter sight,
Budding fresh in morning light?
While the thirsty sun drinks up
The dew-drop from the buttercup.
"Walking, lady, if we go,
We shall see all this and mo.

Come away! It is the spring;
Give it thankful welcoming:
Think what pleasure you will miss
Keeping house a morn like this."

success.

Maidenhead.

J. PAYNE COLLIER.

In my former communication (“N. & Q.” Aug. If any of the readers of "N. & Q." can point out 22, 1868,) I spoke of a friend to whom I gave where the original is to be found they will do me my drawing of the edifice at Bridgnorth in which a great favour. It seems to me so picturesque, so Percy was born, and who had made and was still animating, and partaking so much of the brightmaking collections, literary and artistic, for the ness and sunshine of the scene it describes, that I illustration of the Reliques. I also there, from can hardly impute it to Percy; yet to whom else a better copy in his hands, made certain correc- can we assign it? I have searched many musical tions in a poem, supposed to be the authorship of miscellanies by Bird, Morley, Gibbons, and others, the bishop, and inserted by the Rev. Mr. Pick-thinking it might possibly lurk there, but without ford in his recent highly commendable biographical essay. I say supposed to be the authorship of the bishop, because, looking at the date of it, and the character and wording of the production, I feel some doubt as to its authenticity; but the same friend was in possession of a much better poem, which, he stated, he had transcribed from Percy's own manuscript: still my belief is that it was not his original composition, but that he had written it out from some old lyrical work that had fallen in his way. For many years I have been in search of it without finding it in Drayton, Daniel, Breton, or any of our poets of that day, and somewhat later; for to me it reads as if it were not quite so old as the most recent of those writers. It is rather in the free joyous manner of Herrick, but I can safely assert that it is not contained in his printed volumes. It is short, and I will here submit it to the readers of "N. & Q." as a very interesting and sprightly relic, premising that I transcribed it full forty years ago from a copy which my friend informed me he had made from one in Bishop Percy's well-known handwriting:

A SCOTISH PEER BY COURTESY. During the discussion which ensued in the recent competition before a Committee of Privileges for the Scotish peerage of Balfour of Burley, between Mr. Bruce of Kennet and Major Balfour of Fernie-one the heir of line, and the other the heir-male of the second Lord Balfour of Burley -a good deal was said about charters presumed to exclude the heir of line, of the existence of which no proof was attempted to be adduced. The Lords rejected these presumed charters, and this led to an investigation as to the Scotish law of courtesy.

The original patent of creation of the Burley peerage contained only the grant of a barony, without any mention of heirs. The patentee died, leaving an only daughter, who had previously been married to a gentleman of the name of Arnot, who during his father-in-law's lifetime took the name and bore the arms of Balfour of Burley.

In right of his wife, who upon the death of her parent succeeded to his title, the husband was recognised, it was said, as Lord Burley, and as such sat and voted in the Scotch Parliament.

Major Balfour contended that the second lord sat under some patent or charter which was now lost, by which the peerage was settled on heirs male. Mr. Bruce, on the other hand, asserted that the second lord was a peer by courtesy, in right of his wife; that the grant of barony must be treated as if it were a charter of land, which, if there was no substitution otherwise, fell of necessity to the heir of line. Both these pleas were held by the lords on the committee to be good.

It is remarkable that the law of courtesy should have created doubts at the present date in the mind of any one conversant with the law of Scotland, and yet this came to be the turning-point of the case. If the learned judges and counsel had looked into the Life of Lord Chancellor Clarendon, who lived at a time when the principles relative to succession in Scotland were more understood in England than they appear to be at present, they would have seen what that eminent man knew to be the law in his time.

Charles II. was anxious to unite his son, afterwards Duke of Monmouth, to the Countess of Buccleuch a peeress in her own right. Desirous of putting him in such a position as might warrant his aspiring to the hand of the noble lady, he consulted his chancellor, and showed him the draught of a writing in which Monmouth was styled the king's natural son, and in which it was proposed to give him a title of honɔur.

The chancellor, after reading the paper, told his majesty "that he need not give him other any title of honour than he would enjoy by his marriage, by which he would by the law of Scotland be called Earl of Buccleuch, which would be title enough." He objected to the term of "the king's natural son," as likely to produce inconvenience, and referred to France and Spain, where this recognisal was never made, unless the individual gave notable evidence of his inheriting, or having acquired, such virtues and qualities as made him worthy of his descent. He then concluded with observing that "this gentleman was yet young, and not to be judged of; and therefore, if he were for the present married to this young lady, and assumed her title, as he must do, his majesty might defer for some years making any declaration of paternity."

Charles however had, like many other people, no doubt, made up his mind before asking advice, and he shortly afterwards signed the declaration of paternity, and created his son Duke of MonThis did not affect the soundness of the chancellor's opinion, which may be accepted as matter of the fact that his lordship understood in

mouth.

1683 that any one taking to wife a peeress was, by the law of Scotland, entitled by courtesy to assume her title and sit and vote under it in Parliament.

It may also be noticed that, in Nisbet's Heraldry (par excellence the most valuable treatise of the kind in the North, and which was published in the early part of last century), when referring to the Balfours of Burley, the author distinctly asserts that Arnot of Fernie, by marrying the daughter of the first Lord Burley, became by courtesy, in her right, a Scotish peer. This valuable piece of evidence does not appear to have been made use of or given in evidence. The doctrine of presumed patents, or "must be charters," ventilated in the Burley competition, would be very convenient in peerage claims, as it would supply all sorts of defects.

Admit the convenient doctrine of presumptions not founded on anything like evidence, and where is it to stop? Lord Eldon is reported to have remarked in a question of pedigree, where counsel learned in law pressed upon his lordship that there was only one link wanting in the chain of evidence, and that its existence might be presumed. "One link!" quoth the amazed lawyer; give me but one link, and I will connect myself with the most ancient and noblest families in the kingdom." "De non apparentibus et de non existentibus eadem est ratio," is the proper rule to be applied to all similar presumptions, and one uniformly given effect in the Court of Session.

66

CHAUCER'S CHRONOLOGY.

J. M.

Every reader who has ever opened a Chaucer must remember the opening lines of the prologue, where the poet speaks of the showers of April, and has the lines

"the yonge sonne

Hath in the Ram his halfe course i-ronne." But this passage has never been explained up to the present moment, and I therefore think that many of your readers would be glad to hear that it can be explained so as to be perfectly consistent and correct.

Tyrwhitt saw the difficulty of speaking of the sun being in the Ram in the month of April, and therefore has proposed to read Bole, i. e. Bull. But the MSS. are here against him.

The exact day of April to which Chaucer refers is most probably the 17th, as will be shown presently. Where then was the sun on the 17th of April at that time? The answer is affected by the precession of the equinoxes, which may be accounted for by considering the change of style; with sufficient accuracy, that is, for our present purpose.

The difference between the old and new styles,

which now amounts to twelve days, amounted in Chaucer's time to only eight days. Hence the sun, on the 17th of April, 1386, would be very nearly where he is now on the 25th of April-i. e. in the fifth degree of Taurus. This can be verified by Chaucer's own words, for he says in his treatise on the astrolabe, in a passage which Tyrwhitt appositely quotes, that the vernal equinox, or first degree of Aries, corresponded in his time to the 12th of March; from which it follows, by the use of an astrolabe, that on the 17th of April (old style) he would be in the fifth degree of Taurus, as already calculated. But this is not the actual and visible, but only the theoretical and supposed position of the sun. This is best explained by the following quotation from Milner's Gallery of Nature, p. 149:

"The effect [of the precession of the equinoxes] has been to separate the asterisms from their denominational signs, so that the constellation Aries is in the sign Taurus," &c.

....

And, in fact, a glance at a modern celestial globe shows that the meridian of the eleventh degree of Taurus (which is now nearly where the fifth degree was then) passes near the star u Arietis, which is exactly the central star of the constellation of the Ram. Hence it appears that Chaucer is perfectly and most accurately correct.

In the same way the sun would be in the constellation Gemini when in the sign Cancer, as so expressly stated by our poet in the "Merchauntes Tale," lI. 978-980.

The date, 17th of April, depends on the name given to the day following in the beginning of the "Man of Lawes Prologue." On the fifth line of this Mr. Wright remarks, “Eightetene is the reading in which the MSS. seem mostly to agree. The MS. Harl. reads threttenthe. Tyrwhitt has eight and twenty." But the context may here help us out. The poet (and astronomer) is speaking of a day in which the altitude of the sun at ten o'clock is forty-five degrees. Now on the 18th of April the sun, being in the sixth (now twelfth) degree of Taurus, will have an altitude of about forty-seven degrees at ten o'clock, as nearly as I can tell by the use of a celestial globe; but on the 28th his altitude will be at least fifty degrees. Hence the reading eightetene is more correct. The reading, threttene, would make the sun in the first degree of Taurus, and would give an altitude of almost exactly forty-five degrees; but this rests only upon the authority of one MS., and it would be absurd to press the argument from astronomy so closely as this, when we notice that the fact of the sun's altitude being about forty-five degrees was merely derived from the rough observation of perceiving a shadow to be as long, to all appearance, as the object that cast it. The "half an houre and more mentioned in this passage must be interpreted much less strictly; for the fourth part of a

"day artificial," i. e. of the time between sunrise and sunset, would be at about half-past eight, leaving a difference of an hour and a half till ten o'clock. Yet Chaucer speaks very naturally, since it is very difficult to guess at all closely by such an observation of the sky. Hence, what does he make "our host" do? He first notes that the sun has performed a quarter of his course, and half an hour besides-aye, and more too, from which he knows it must certainly be already nine o'clock -a fact which his interest in the stories he has heard has prevented him from perceiving before; and, secondly, he takes another observation of a more exact character, from which he concludes that it can want but a few minutes of being ten o'clock (I calculate that the sun would be fortyfive degrees high at about a quarter to ten), and he at once bursts out into exclamations about the loss of time.

Since writing my note upon the "Knightes Tale," a friend has drawn my attention to the very ingenious letters signed A. E. B. in "N. & Q." 1st S. iii. I cannot agree with much that is there advanced, though stated with great ability. For instance, the third of April is there said to be the day of Palamon's being found by Arcite, whereas it is the fourth, since the "third night" is followed by the fourth day, as a matter of course. The true key is Chaucer's own Treatise on the Astrolabe, never yet correctly printed, but on which I am now bestowing much labour, that the E. E. T. S. edition may be as perfect as possible. Many passages of our early English writers still require, and merit, elucidation.

1, Cintra Terrace, Cambridge.

WALTER W. SKEAT.

VERSES TO HENRIETTE MARIE BY JASPER

MAYNE.

Reading MR. BOLTON CORNEY's contribution from the Musarum Oxoniensium of 1643 ("N. & Q." 4th S. ii. 147), I was reminded of a similar little volume on my shelves, also containing a poem to Charles I.'s queen by the same poet. The volume friend Dr. Bliss's collection of Oxford books, and is probably rare, as it was wanting in my late I do not find it described in any work at hand. It is a small 4to of forty-four leaves, with the following title, which I give in full :

"Musarum Oxoniensium CHARISTERIA pro Serenissima Regina Maria, recens e nixus laboriosi discrimine recepta. Oxoniæ, Typis Leonard Lichfield Academiæ Typographi, M.DC.XXXVIII."

The verses are as follows:

[blocks in formation]
« ZurückWeiter »