Читать книгу Notes and Queries, Number 77, April 19, 1851 - Various - Страница 5

King Richard III. (Vol. iii., p. 221.).—On the 14th May, 1491 (6 Henry VII.), one Master William Burton, the schoolmaster of St. Leonard's Hospital, in the city of York, was accused before the magistrates of having said that "King Richard was an hypocrite, a crocheback, and buried in a dike like a dog." This circumstance is recorded in a contemporary document of unquestionable authenticity (vide extracts from York Records in the Fifteenth Century, p. 220.); and must remove all doubt as to the fact of Richard's bodily deformity. The conjecture of Dr. Wallis, quoted by G. F. G., can have no weight when opposed by clear evidence that the word "crouchback," as a term of reproach or contempt, was applied to King Richard within a few years after his death, by one to whom his person must have been familiarly known.

Δ.

Shakespeare a thorough Sailor.—Let me point attention to a genuine nautical expression, in the use of which Shakespeare shows himself a thorough sailor:

In a "fore and aft sail" of the present day, the "shoulder" is the foremost upper corner, and the last part of the canvass on which the wind fixes its influence when a vessel is "sailing by the wind," or even "off the wind." The "veriest lout" in the "after-guard" will appreciate the truthfulness and beauty of the metaphor.

A. L.

"A fellow-feeling," &c.—

This oft-quoted line is from Garrick's Epilogue on quitting the stage.

Γ.

Early Instances of the World "News."—Without the slightest intention of re-opening the discussion as to whether the word "newes" be of native growth or imported, I would beg leave to suggest as a means of completing its history, that should any of the readers of "Notes and Queries," whose researches may lead amongst the authorities of the fifteenth century, meet with instances of the word in familiar use between A.D. 1400 and A.D. 1500, they would notify the same.

The earliest date of its colloquial use as yet recorded in "Notes and Queries," is A.D. 1513: on the other hand, the word, so far as I am aware, is nowhere used by Chaucer, although his near approach to it in the following lines is very remarkable:

After this, the transition to the word itself is so extremely easy, that it could not be far distant.

A. E. B.

Under the Rose.—It may interest the inquirers into the origin of this expression to know, that at Lullingston Castle in Kent, the residence of Sir Percival Dyke, there is in the hall an old picture, or painted carving (I forget which, as it is many years since I saw it), of a rose, some two feet in diameter, surrounded by an inscription, which, if I remember right, runs as follows, or nearly so:—

It is now, or was when I saw it, in the hall of that ancient mansion, but I believe had been brought from an old house in the neighbourhood.

E. H. Y.