Notes and Queries, Number 48, September 28, 1850 | Page 3

off, which exactly fitted to the
boy's jacket. This decided his execution: yet justice was not vindictive,
for very few persons were executed.
I will trespass yet further on your pages to recite one other incident of
the riots that occurred in connexion with the attack on the King's Bench
prison, and the death of Allen, which made a great stir at the time. The
incident I refer to happened thus:--At the gate of the prison two
sentinels were placed. One of these was a fine-built young man, full six
feet high: he had been servant to my father. On the day Allen was shot,
or a day or two after, he came to my father for protection: my father
having a high opinion of his veracity and moral goodness, took him in
and sheltered him until quiet was restored. His name was M'Phin, or

some such name; but as he was always called "Mac" by us, I do not
remember his name perfectly. He stated that he and his fellow-soldier,
while standing as sentries at the prison, were attacked by an uproarious
mob, and were assailed with stones and brickbats;--that his companion
called loudly to the mob, and said, "I will not fire until I see and mark a
man that throws at us, and then he shall die. I don't want to kill the
innocent, {275} or any one; but he that flings at us shall surely die."
Young Allen threw a brick-bat, and ran off; but Mac said, his
fellow-soldier had seen it, and marked him. The crowd gave way; off
went Allen and the soldier after him. Young Allen ran on, the soldier
pursuing him, till he entered his father's premises, who was a
cow-keeper, and there the soldier shot him. Popular fury turned upon
poor Mac; and so completely was he thought to be the "murderer" of
young Allen that 500l. was offered by the mob for his discovery. But
my good father was faithful to honest Mac, and he lay secure in one of
our upper rooms until the excitement was over.
Allen's funeral was attended by myriads, and a monument was erected
to his memory (which yet remains, I believe) in Newington churchyard,
speaking lies in the face of the sun. If it were important enough, it
deserves erasure as much as the false inscription on London's
monument.
As soon as the public blood was cool, "Mac" surrendered himself, was
tried at the Old Bailey, and acquitted.
Should it be in the power of any of the readers of your interesting
miscellany, by reference to the Session Papers, to give me the actual
name of poor "Mac," I shall feel obliged.
SENEX.
September 9. 1850.
[Footnote 1: Mr. Cunningham, vol. i. p. 69., gives an interesting
quotation from Strype respecting Worcester House, which gave the
name of "Worcester Grounds" to Mr. Kitchener's property.]
* * * * *
SATIRICAL POEMS ON WILLIAM III.
Some years since I copied from a MS. vol., compiled before 1708, the
following effusions of a Jacobite poet, who seems to have been "a good
hater" of King William. I have made ineffectual efforts to discover the
witty author, or to ascertain if these compositions have ever been

printed. My friend, in whose waste-book I found them,--a beneficed
clergyman in Worcestershire, who has been several years
dead,--obtained them from a college friend during the last century.
"UPON KING WILLIAM'S TWO FIRST CAMPAGNES.
"'Twill puzzle much the author's brains, That is to write your story, To
know in which of these campagnes You have acquired most glory: For
when you march'd the foe to fight, Like Heroe, nothing fearing, Namur
was taken in your sight, And Mons within your hearing."
"ON THE OBSERVING THE 30TH OF JANUARY, 1691.
"Cease, Hippocrites, to trouble heaven How can ye think to be forgiven
The dismall deed you've done? When to the martyr's sacred blood, This
very moment, if you could, You'd sacrifice his son."
"ON KING WILLIAM'S RETURN OUT OF FLANDERS.
"Rejoice, yee fops, yo'r idoll's come agen To pick yo'r pocketts, and to
slay yo'r men; Give him yo'r millions, and his Dutch yo'r lands: Don't
ring yo'r bells, yee fools, but wring yo'r hands."
GRENDON.
* * * * *
SHAKSPEARE'S GRIEF AND FRENZY.
I have looked into many an edition of Shakspeare, but I have not found
one that traced the connexion that I fancy exists between the lines--
_Cassius._ "I did not think you could have been so angry."
_Brutus._ "O Cassius! I am sick of many griefs."
or between
_Brutus._ "No man bears sorrow better.--Portia is dead."
_Cassius._ "How 'scaped I killing when I crossed you so!"
_Julius Cæsar_, Act iv. Sc. 3.
which will perhaps better suit the object that I have in view. The editors
whose notes I