Replies.

SCANDAL AGAINST QUEEN ELIZABETH.

(Vol. ii., p. 393.; Vol. iii., pp. 11. 151. 197.)

The Marquis of Ormonde having been informed that certain statements, little complimentary to the reputation of Queen Elizabeth, and equally discreditable to the name of his ancestor, Thomas, Earl of Ormonde, have appeared in "Notes and Queries," wherein it is stated "that the Ormonde family possess documents which afford proof of this," begs to assure the editor of the journal in question, that the Ormonde collection of papers, &c. contains nothing that bears the slightest reference to the very calumnious attack on the character of good Queen Bess.

Hampton Court, March 17. 1851.

[If the Marquis of Ormonde will do us the favour to refer to our Number for the 8th March (No. 71.), he will find he has not been correctly informed with respect to the article to which his note relates. The family in which the papers are stated to exist, is clearly not that of the noble Marquis, but the family with which our correspondent "J. Bs." states himself to be "connected;" and we hope J. Bs. will, in justice both to himself and to Queen Elizabeth, adopt the course suggested in the following communication. We believe the warmest admirers of that great Queen cannot better vindicate her character than by making a strict inquiry into the grounds for the scandals, which, as has been already shown (antè, No. 62. p. 11.), were so industriously circulated against her.]

J. Bs. says papers are "said to exist in the family which prove the statement." As it is one of scandal against a female, and that female a great sovereign, should he not ascertain the fact of the existence of any such paper, before supporting the scandal, and not leave a tradition to be supported by another tradition, when a little trouble might show whether any papers exist, and when found what their value may be.

Q. G.

THE MISTLETOE ON THE OAK.

(Vol. ii., pp. 163. 214.; Vol. iii., p. 192.)

From having been a diligent searcher for the mistletoe on the oak, I may be allowed to make a few remarks upon the question. Is it ever found now on other trees? Now, it not only occurs abundantly on other trees, but it is exceedingly rare on the oak. This may be gathered from the following list, in which numbers have been used to express comparative frequency, as near as my observations enable me to form a judgment:—

From this it would appear that notwithstanding the British Oak grows everywhere, it is at present only favoured by the companionship of the mistletoe in equal ratio with two comparatively recently introduced trees. Indeed such objection does this parasite manifest to the brave old tree, even in his teens, that, notwithstanding a newly-planted line of mixed trees will become speedily attacked by it, the oak is certain to be left in his pride alone.

I have, however, seen the mistletoe on the oak in two instances during my much wandering about amid country scenes, especially of Gloucester and Worcester, two great mistletoe counties. One was pointed out to me by my friend, Mr. Lees, from whom we may expect much valuable information on this subject, in his forthcoming edition of the Botanical Looker-out—it was on a young tree, perhaps of fifty years, in Eastnor Park, on the Malvern chain. The other example is at Frampton-on-Severn, to which the President of the Cotteswold Naturalists' Club, T. B. L. Baker, Esq., and myself, were taken by Mr. Clifford, of Frampton. The tree is full a century old, and the branch, on which was a goodly bunch of the parasite, numbered somewhere about forty years. That the plant is propagated by seeds there can, I think, be but little doubt, as the seeds are so admirably adapted for the peculiar circumstances under which alone they can propagate; and the want of attention to the facts connected therewith, is probably the cause why the propagation of the mistletoe by artificial means is usually a failure.

I should be inclined to think that the mistletoe never was abundant on the oak; so that it may be that additional sanctity was conferred on the Viscum guerneum on account of its great rarity.

James Buckman.

Cirencester.

Mistletoe upon Oak (Vol. ii., p. 214.).—Besides the mistletoe-bearing oak mentioned by your correspondent, there is one in Lord Somers' park, near Malvern. It is a very fine plant, though it has been injured by sight-seeing marauders.

H. A. B.

Trinity College, Cambridge.

Mistletoe (Vol. ii., pp. 163., 214.).—Do I understand your correspondent to ask whether mistletoe is found now except on oaks? The answer is, as at St. Paul's, "Circumspice." Just go into the country a little. The difficulty is generally supposed to be to find it on the oak.

C. B.

UNIVERSALITY OF THE MAXIM, "LAVORA COME SE TU," ETC.

(Vol. iii., p. 188.)

I have not been able to trace this sentence to its source, but it would most probably be found in that admirable book, Monosinii Floris Italicæ Linguæ, 4to, Venet., 1604; or in Torriano's Dictionary of Italian Proverbs and Phrases, folio, Lond., 1666, a book of which Duplessis doubts the existence! Most of Jeremy Taylor's citations from the Italian are proverbial phrases. Your correspondent has probably copied the phrase as it stands in Bohn's edition of the Holy Living and Dying, but there is a trifling variation as it stands in the first edition of Holy Living, 1650:—

The universality of this maxim, in ages and countries remote from each other, is remarkable. Thus we find it in the Hitopadésa:

"A wise man should think upon knowledge and wealth as if he were undecaying and immortal. He should practise duty as if he were seized by the hair of his head by Death."—Johnson's Translation, Intr. S.

So Democratis of Abdera, more sententiously:

"Οὕτος πειρῶ ζῆν, ὡς καὶ ὀλίγον καὶ πολὺν χρόνον βιωσόμενος."

Then descending to the fifteenth century, we have it thus in the racy old Saxon Laine Doctrinal:

Where the author of the Voyage autour de ma Chambre, Jean Xavier Maitre, stumbled upon it, or whether it was a spontaneous thought, does not appear; but in his pleasing little book, Lettres sur la Vieillesse, we have it thus verbatim:

"Il faut vivre comme si l'on avoit à mourir demain, mais s'arranger en même temps sa vie, autant que cet arrangement peut dépendre de notre prévoyance, comme si l'on avoit devant soi quelques siècles, et même une éternité d'existence."

Some of your correspondents may possibly be able to indicate other repetitions of this truly "golden sentence," which cannot be too often repeated, for we all know that

S. W. Singer.