Notes and Queries, Number 57, November 30, 1850

Notes and Queries, Number 57, November 30, 1850
Various

Various

Notes and Queries, Number 57, November 30, 1850

NOTES

PORTRAIT OF CARDINAL BEATON

A portrait of this eminent Man was engraved by Pennant, from a picture at Holyrood House, in Part II. of his Tour in Scotland, p. 243. 4to. Lond. 1776. Lodge has an engraving from the same portrait in his collection of Illustrious Personages. This is a strange circumstance; because, when Pinkerton was about to include this portrait in his collection, Pennant wrote to him, on 30th April, 1796, as follows:

"Give me leave to say, that I suspect the authenticity of my Cardinal Beaton. I fear it is Cardinal Falconer or Falconieri. I think there is a genuine one somewhere in Scotland. It will be worth your while to inquire if there be one, and engrave it, and add my suspicions, which induce you do it."—Pinkerton's Correspondence, vol. i. p. 402. 8vo. Lond. 1830.

Pinkerton made inquiry, and on Dec. 1st, 1797, writes to the Earl of Buchan:

"Mr. Pennant informs me the Cardinal Beaton is false. It is, indeed, too modern. A real Beaton is said to exist in Fife."—Pinkerton's Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 17.

Lord Buchan writes to him that Mr. Beaton, of Balfour, believes himself to have a genuine portrait of the Cardinal, and offers it for engraving. The authenticity of this portrait, however, appears not to have been established, and it was not engraved. Another was found at Yester, and was at first concluded to be a genuine original: but Lady Ancram soon discovered that it possessed no marks of originality, but might be a good copy: it was, however, certainly not one of the six cardinals purchased by the third Earl of Lothian. Finally, it was rejected altogether. A copy of a portrait from the Vatican was also rejected as undoubtedly spurious. It appears, therefore, that Pinkerton, in this case at least, exercised caution in the selection of his subject for engraving, so far as concerned authenticity. His criticism, that the Holyrood House portrait is "too modern," will be agreed in by all who will take the trouble to compare the portrait in Lodge with undoubted portraits of the time: the style is too modern by a hundred years. But the portrait is of a man upwards of sixty years old: Beaton was murdered in 1546, in the fiftieth year of his age. The portrait is of a dark haired man without beard.

I now come to a portrait of Beaton which there appears reason to think is genuine, and I beg the favour of your correspondents to give me any information in their power regarding it. This portrait is in the Roman Catholic College at Blairs, near Aberdeen. It was in the Scotch College at Rome down to the period of the French occupation of that city in 1798, and formed part of the plunder from that college. It was subsequently discovered in a sale-room by the late Abbé Macpherson, rector of the same college, who purchased it and sent it to Blairs, where it has been for, now, a good many years. That it is a portrait of Beaton's time is certain; but the artist is unknown, and the picture has sustained damage. It is attributed, by a competent judge, who has himself painted two careful copies of it, to Titian, not only from its general style and handling, but from certain peculiarities of canvas, &c., on which latter circumstances, however, he does not lay much stress, taking them only as adminicles in proof. The portrait is a half-length, about 2 ft. 6 in. by 2 ft.: it is that of a fresh-coloured, intellectual man, of forty-five or upwards; hazel eyes; hair slightly reddish, or auburn, just becoming tinged with grey; a thin small beard; costume similar to that of Holbein's Cardinal Wolsey, in the hall of Christchurch, Oxford. It bears this inscription, painted at the bottom of the portrait, and over the original finished painting, and therefore of a subsequent date:

"David Betonius, S.R.E., Card. Archiep. S. Andreæ in Scotia, ab Hostibus Fidei Barbare Trucidatus."

Beaton was elected to the Cardinalate in Dec. 1538; did he visit Rome after that? He was at all events in Paris. The Scotch College at Rome was a natural habitat for a portrait of a Scottish churchman so famous as Cardinal Beaton, and it would be strange indeed if they had not one of him where they affected a collecion of portraits of British prelates. I propose to have this portrait engraved, if its probable authenticity cannot be shaken. Did Pinkerton engrave any portrait of Beaton? There is none in my copies of his Iconographia Scotica, 1797, and his Scottish Gallery, 1799. These contain several duplicates; but it is rare to meet with copies that can be warranted perfect. If the portrait be published, it will probably be accompanied by a short memoir, correcting from authentic documents some of the statements of his biographers: any information either as to the portrait or his life will be thankfully acknowledged. One or two letters from Lord Buchan, on the subject of Scottish Portraits, appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine, vol. lxv., but not relating to this particular one.

    SCOTUS.

ON THE POINTING OF A PASSAGE IN "ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL."

Lafeu. "They say miracles are past: and we have our philosophical persons, to make modern and familiar, things, supernatural and causeless."—Act ii. Scene 3.

So the passage is pointed in Johnson and Steevens, that is, with a comma after the word "things;" and the same pointing is used in the recent editions of Mr. Knight, Barry Cornwall, and Mr. Collier.

It occurred to me that this pointing gave a meaning quite out of harmony with what directly follows, and also with the spirit in which Lafeu speaks. Let the comma be placed after "familiar", and the whole passage be read thus:

Lafeu. "They say miracles are past; and we have our philosophical persons to make modern and familiar, things supernatural and causeless. Hence is it, that we make trifles of terrors; ensconcing ourselves into seeming knowledge, when we should submit ourselves to an unknown fear."

Lafeu apparently is speaking somewhat sarcastically of those who say miracles are past, and who endeavour to explain away the wonderful into something common and well-known. Subsequently I found that Mr. Coleridge, in his Literary Remains (vol. ii. p. 121.), had adduced the above-mentioned passage, placing the comma after "familiar." He does not, however, make any observation on the other pointing; but remarking, that Shakspeare often uses "modern" for "common," proceeds thus:

"Shakspeare, inspired, as it might seem, with all knowledge, here uses the word causeless in its strict philosophical sense; cause being truly predicable only of phenomena,—that is, things natural, and not of noumena, or things supernatural."

It is, perhaps, rather curious, that although Mr. Collier, in his note on Lafeu's speech, has quoted the above from Mr. Coleridge, the improved pointing should have escaped that gentleman's notice.

Looking into Theobald's Shakspeare, I find that he also had placed the comma as Mr. Coleridge has. Mr. Theobald adds this note:

"This, as it has hitherto been printed, is directly opposite to our poet's and his speaker's meaning. As I have stopped it, the sense quadrates with the context: and surely it is one unalterable property of philosophy to make seeming strange and preternatural phenomena familiar and reducible to cause and reason."

Does not Mr. Theobald, in his closing remark, turn what in Lafeu is really an ironical outburst on would-be philosophers, into something like a serious common-place?

    A. ROFFE.

Query, In a work entitled Philosophy of Shakspeare, by W.H. Roukin, Lafeu's speech is quoted, and one word changed; "and we have our philosophical persons," &c., becomes "yet we have," &c. Is there any authority for such a change?

    A.R.

FOLK LORE

The bigger the Ring, the nearer the Wet.—On Sunday evening, the 20th Oct., the moon had a very fine ring round it, which apparently was based near the horizon, and spread over a considerable area of the heavens. This was noticed by myself and others as we returned home from church; and upon my mentioning it to my man-servant, who is a countryman, he said he had been noticing it, and that it reminded him of the old saying, "the bigger the ring, the nearer the wet." On the next day, however, it was fine and windy, and my faith began to be shaken as to the truth of the saying; but the almost incessant rain of the four or five subsequent days fully proved its correctness.

    J.A.

Power of prophesying before Death.—To the passages on this subject lately supplied by your correspondents (Vol. ii., pp. 116. 196.) may be added the following from Tertullian, De Anima, c. 53. (vol. ii. col. 741., ed. Migne, Paris, 1844):

"Evenit sæpe animam in ipso divortio potentius agitari, sollicitiore obtutu, extraordinariâ loquacitate, dum ex majori suggestu, jam in libero constituta, per superfluum quod adhuc cunctatur in corpore enuntiat quæ videt, quæ audit, quæ incipit nosse."

    J.C.R.

Change in the Appearance of the Dead.—A woman near Maidstone, who had had much experience as a sick-nurse, told me some years ago that she had always noticed in corpses a change to a more placid expression on the third day after death; and she supposed this to be connected with our Lord's resurrection. I omitted to ask her whether the belief were wholly the result of her own observation, or whether it had been taught her by others, and were common among her neighbours.

    J.C.R.

Strange Remedies.—I find some curious prescriptions in an old book entitled The Pathway to Health, &c. (I will not trouble you with the full title), "by Peter Levens, Master of Arts in Oxford, and Student in Physick and Chirurgery."… "Printed for J.W., and are to bee sold by Charles Tym, at the Three Bibles on London Bridge, MDCLXIV." The first is a charm

For all manner of falling evils.—Take the blood of his little finger that is sick, and write these three verses following, and hang it about his neck:

'Jasper fert Mirrham, Thus Melchior Balthazar Aurum,

Hæc quicum secum portat tria nomina regum,
Soleitur à morbo, Domini pietate, caduca.'

and it shall help the party so grieved."

"For a man or woman that is in a consumption.—Take a brasse pot, and fill it with water, and set it on the fire, and put a great earthen pot within that pot, and then put in these parcels following:—Take a cock and pull him alive, then flea off his skin, then beat him in pieces; take dates a pound, and slit out the stones, and lay a layer of them in the bottom of the pot, and then lay a piece of the cock, and upon that some more of the dates, and take succory, endive, and parsley roots, and so every layer one upon another, and put in fine gold and some pearl, and cover the pot as close as may bee with coarse dow, and so let it distill a good while, and so reserve it for your use till such time as you have need thereof."

I could select some exceedingly ludicrous prescriptions (for the book contains 400 pages), but the most curious unfortunately happen to be the most indelicate. Besides this, I am afraid the subject is scarcely worthy of much space in such an important and useful work as "NOTES AND QUERIES."

    ALEXANDER ANDREWS.

Abridge, Essex.

Mice as a Medicine (Vol. i., p. 397.).—An old woman lately recommended an occasional roast mouse as a certain cure for a little boy who wetted his bed at night. Her own son, she said, had got over this weakness by eating three roast mice. I am told that the Faculty employ this remedy, and that it has been prescribed in the Oxford Infirmary.

    J.W.H.

Omens from Birds.—It is said that for a bird to fly into a room, and out again, by an open window, surely indicates the decease of some inmate. Is this belief local?

    J.W.H.