_Pasquinade on Leo XII._--The Query put to a Pope (Vol. ii., p. 104.), which it is difficult to believe could be put orally, reminds me of Pope Leo XII., who was reported, whether truly or not, to have been the reverse of scrupulous in the earlier part of his life, but was remarkably strict after he became Pope, and was much disliked at Rome, perhaps because, by his maintenance of strict discipline, he abridged the amusements and questionable indulgences of the people. On account of his death, { 132} which took place just before the time of the carnival in 1829, the usual festivities were omitted, which gave occasion to the following pasquinade, which was much, though privately, circulated--
"Tre cose mat fecesti, O Padre santo: Accettar il papato, Viver tanto, Morir di Carnivale Per destar pianto."
_Shakspeare a Brass-rubber._--I am desirous to notice, if no commentator has forestalled me, that Shakspeare, among his many accomplishments, was sufficiently beyond his age to be a brass-rubber:
"What's on this tomb I cannot read; the character I'll take with _wax_."
From the "soft impression," however, alluded to in the next scene, his "wax" appears rather to have been the forerunner of _gutta percha_ than of _heel-ball_.
_California._--In the _Voyage round the World_, by Captain George Shelvocke, begun Feb. 1719, he says of California (_Harris's Collection_, vol. i. p. 233.):--
"The soil about Puerto, Seguro, and very likely in most of the valleys, is a rich black mould, which, as you turn it fresh up to the sun, appears as if intermingled with gold dust; some of which we endeavoured to purify and wash from the dirt; but though we were a little prejudiced against the thoughts that it could be possible that this metal should be so promiscuously and universally mingled with common earth, yet we endeavoured to cleanse and wash the earth from some of it; and the more we did the more it appeared like gold. In order to be further satisfied I brought away some of it, which we lost in our confusion in China."
How an accident prevented the discovery, more than a century back, of the golden harvest now gathering in California!
_Mayor of Misrule and Masters of the Pastimes._--the word _Maior_ of Misrule appears in the Harl. MSS. 2129. as having been on glass in the year 1591, in Denbigh Church.