The Numbered Sections in Old English Poetical MSS. By Henry Bradley. From the Proceedings of the British Academy. (Published for the British Academy: Humphrey Milford, 1s. 6d.) A CURIOUS feature of Old English narrative poems in MS. is the division of the text into sections which, in Beowulf' and in some other cases, do not always correspond with natural divisions in the sense. The sections are marked by roman numerals, and by the occurrence of a word in capitals. Already, in his article on Beowulf' in 'The Encyclopædia Britannica,' Dr. Bradley had conjectured that these numbered sections might correspond to numbered loose sheets from which the scribe who wrote the codex copied. There is certainly no difficulty in seeing that the reproduction of this tale of divisions might be useful in several ways.

In the article before us Dr. Bradley takes leaf by leaf, line by line, the Old English poems in which this numbering occurs, and the result of this examination, and explication of the evidence thus brought together, is indisputably to transform the original conjecture into a well-proved conclusion. It will be gathered that this is a critical paper of real importance.

There arises, naturally, the further interesting question as to whether the writing on the loose sheets may be taken as the original autograph of the author of the poem. In the four poems dealt with here-the paraphrase of Genesis, the translation of the Old Saxon Paradise Lost,' the Exodus,' and Cynewulf's Elene'-Dr. Bradley has demonstrated the astonishing uniformity as to quantity of matter sheet by sheet throughout each several poem. He also points out that each sheet, almost without an exception, finishes with a full stop at the end of a verse. He cannot well be wrong in the opinion that only the original author could have brought this to pass; and that the measure of his sheet was taken by the poet as a structural measure in the composition of his poem. As he truly says, this is not a more strictly mechanical method of construction than many which poets have resorted to; it must, in fact, in itself have been considerably easier to manage than a sequence of sonnets. Dr. Bradley sees in this an additional reason for refusing to attribute the paraphrase of Genesis to Cædmon-an attribution which has lately been attempted afresh.

In conclusion we may utter a word of gratitude for the lucid and attractive way in which matters, dry and technical despite their great interest, are here set before us.

The Church Bells of Lancashire.-Part I. The Hundreds of West Derby and Leyland. By F. H. Cheetham. (Manchester, Richard Gill, 38. 6d. net.)

THIS reprint from the Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society gives us alphabets of the places within these two hundreds where are to be found churches built before 1800, or bells made before that date. All the bells of the pre-nineteenth century churches are carefully described their inscriptions are given in full, and, in the case of the more interesting examples, in facsimile; matters relating to the bells from the parish accounts and other original sources are lavishly supplied. Mr. Cheetham prefaces each alphabet with a general introduction about the bells

of the hundred, adding to that for West Derby notes on the different bell-founders with whose work he comes to deal. Only 50 copies of this reprint are to be sold, and are to be obtained of the author at 53 Walnut Street, Southport. Lovers of the subject who have not seen this excellent piece of work in its original form may be glad to know where to obtain it.

has for frontispiece a reproduction of the AdoraTHE July number of The Burlington Magazine tion of the Magi' by Bramantino, one of the few pictures belonging to the Layard bequest which National Gallery. It is an early work, Mr. have recently been placed on exhibition at the Tancred Borenius agreeing with Prof. Suida in fixing its date shortly before the year 1500. Mr. O. C. Gangoly follows with an article on Southern photographs of these elaborate works of art, Indian lamps, accompanied by two pages of which are used as personal votive offerings to the deities in Hindu worship. Mr. Lionel Cust discusses and reproduces the portrait of Mary, Queen of Scots, recently secured by the National Portrait Gallery. This portrait is, he thinks, based upon a drawing probably by Francis Clouet, and represents, therefore, an early period in the life of the unfortunate Queen. Mr. Robert Ross has an article on the frescoes on the walls of the Buddhist cave temple at Ajanta, and reproduces some of the copies taken in 1909-11 by Lady Herringham and her assistants, and now published by the India Society. He is rather inclined to consider these frescoes over-estimated as works of art, and casts some doubt on Lady Herringham's claim for them of primitive origin. Mr. Archibald G. B. Russell writes on heraldry in connexion with the exhibition at the Burlington Fine Arts Club. Mr. C. Stanley Clarke illustrates some fine specimens of Dravidian swords, selected from the collection lent by Lord Kitchener to the Indian Section of the Victoria and Albert Museum. These splendid weapons represent an art now practically extinct in India, though in 1889 Mr. E. B. Havell reported the finding of three of the hereditary ironsmiths at Sivaganga in Madura.

The Athenæum now appearing monthly, arrangements have been made whereby advertisements of posts vacant and wanted, which it is desired to publish weekly, may appear in the intervening weeks in 'N. & Q.'

Notices to Correspondents.

Y. T.-Forwarded.

MRS. E. C. WIENHOLT.-Forwarded to B. B. MR. W. R. WILLIAMS.-Forwarded to MAJOR LESLIE.

H. K. ST. J. S. (Shakespeare's Falcon Crest' ante, p. 35).—MR. A. R. BAYLEY is grateful for the passages in Tennyson where that poet makes the falcon feminine.

MR. ANEURIN WILLIAMS ("Wordsworth's friend Jones ").-Some correspondence on this subject will be found at 11 S. vi. 55 and 211. At the latter reference is an account of Jones from the pen of our valued and lamented correspondent W. P. COURTNEY.

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The dedication is instructive :

To the Right Honourable,

The Nobility, and the Most Generous Gentry, that are pleased to Grace this Annual Festivity with their Presence.

Right Honourable, and Most Generous,

Our due Resentment of your kinde presence at

this our Annuall Convention, animated us to a Resolution for some Novel Divertisement, as our gratefull Testimony for such your Noble and Candid Favours; It is an Embryo of a short Conception, and therefore cannot be expected capable of a perfect formation; Nor was it ever designed to be duly modelled into the Dimensions of Acts and Scenes, as ought to become a Theatre, but only for a small Fascicle of Rustick-Drollery, intermixt with some Serious Reflections of the

happinesse of your Rurall Life; and to Invite your benign Thoughts for the Good of this County. As it is, it imploreth your favourable Patronage, and was intended to have been now fully Performed, but finding too many Difficulties to occur, beyond our Expectation, and our time but short, we could only procure the Representation of part of it, and must therefore fly to your good nature for our Refuge; as confident, that our good intention will finde your Serene Acceptation, which is all the Ambition of, Your most humble Servant,

June 20, 1678.

W. M.

With the clue "W. M." to help I again referred to the British Museum Catalogue, and was at once successful in finding two copies in our national library. The press-mark of one is 643 d. 31, and the other, a cropped 55. I find that Bohn's copy, 162 i. Lowndes' Bibliographer's Manual,' 1871, vol. ii. p. 1431, records the sale of a Roxburghe, 4176, 198." He prints "Huntingdon" for Huntington. Thus four copies are known.

copy,

66

The Preface is rather lengthy, so I give two extracts that relate specially to the author :

"In order to this, I take it for necessary to Premise, that the Author of it, a Man of more Modesty than the Generality of our present Writers, tho' not of less Merit than the best of 'em, was neither fond of his own Performances, nor desirous others should fall in love with them. What he writ was for his own Diversion; and he could hardly be persuaded by the Quality to make it theirs, till his good Temper got the better of his Aversion to write himself among the Lists of the Poets; and he was prevail'd upon to put it into the Hands of the Gentlemen belonging to the Theatre in Drury-Lane, who did him the same Justice as was done by him to Dramatick Poetry and the Stage.... What remains is, to justifie the Publication of it, and to acquaint the World, it; and out of my desire to divert the Publick, I that the Author being deceas'd, I got a Copy of thought it might not be unacceptable if it saw the Light."

A MS. note on the fly-leaf says:—

"The initials' W. M.' subscribed to the dedication of the first of these pieces, and inserted in the title-page of the second, seem to designate them as the works of the same author. The Female to have been first published in 1897. J. F."

"June y 17th 1678.

shire man.

The Female Wits' is written in the style of a rehearsal, and is intended as banter on Mrs. Manley, Mrs. Pix, and Mrs. C. Trotter.

Other pieces I have notes of by a "W. M." include The Queen's Closet Opened,' 1656, 1662, and 1671. The 1656 is the second edition, and not in British Museum, Bodleian, Trinity College, Dublin, the Faculty of Advocates, Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society, or Royal College of Physicians, and, although of about the same period as our book, not, I think, by our author.

The Feast must have been rather an

important function, as it was held in Merchant Taylors' Hall, the largest of those belonging to the London companies. The Hall was rebuilt after the Great Fire of London, being completed in 1671, and there the Feast was held seven years later.