Notes And Queries, Issue 34

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No. 34.

SATURDAY, JUNE 22. 1850.

Price Threepence. Stamped Edition 4d.

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Notes:—
The Agapemone of the Sixteenth Century, by E. F. Rimbault, LL.D.	49
Punishment of Death by Burning, by C. Ross and Rev. A. Gatty	50
Folk Lore:—Death-bed Mystery—Easter Eggs—May Marriages—"Trash" or "Skriker"	51
Notes on Milton	53
Colvil's Whigg's Supplication	53
Queries:—
Hubert le Sœur's Six Brass Statues by E. F. Rimbault, LL.D.	54
Bishop Jewell's Library	54
The Low Window	55
Minor Queries:—North Sides of Churchyards—Hatfield—Ulrich von Hutten—Simon of Ghent—Boetius—Gloucestershire Gospel Tree—Churchyards—Epitaphs—Anthony Warton—Cardinal's Hat—Maps of London—Griffith of Penrhyn—Mariner's Compass—Pontefract on the Thames	55
Replies:—
Study of Geometry in Lancashire by T. T. Wilkinson	57
Queries Answered, No. 8., by Bolton Corney	60
Meaning of Bawn	60
Replies to Minor Queries:—Births, Marriages, &c.—M. or N.—Arabic Numerals—Comment in Apocalypsin—Robert Deverell—Hippopotamus—Ashes to Ashes—Dr. Maginn's Miscellanies—Living Dog better than a Dead Lion—Gaol Chaplains—Rome, Ancient and Modern—Trianon	60
Miscellanies:—
Aboriginal Chambers near Tilbury—Mistake in Conybeare and Howson's Life of St. Paul	62
Miscellaneous:—
Notes on Books, Catalogues, Sales, &c.	63
Books and Odd Volumes Wanted	63
Notices to Correspondents	63
Advertisements	64

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As it is not generally known that the "Agapemone" had a prototype in the celebrated Family of Love, some account of this "wicked sect" may not at this moment be without interest to your readers:—

"Henry Nicholas, a Westphalian, born at Munster, but who had lived a great while at Amsterdam, and some time likewise at Embden, was the father of this family. He appeared upon the stage about the year 1540, styled himself the deified man, boasted of great matters, and seemed to exalt himself above the condition of a human creature. He was, as he pretended, greater than Moses and Christ, because Moses had taught mankind to hope, Christ to believe, but he to love; which last being of more worth than both the former, he was consequently greater than both those prophets."—See Brandt's Hist. of the Reform, &c., in the Low Countries, vol. i. p. 105, ed. 1720.

According to some writers, however, the sect was not founded by Henry Nicholas, but by David George, an Anabaptist enthusiast of Delft, who died in 1556; and indeed there is some reason to believe that the Family of Love grew out of the heresies of the said George, with whom Nicholas had been on friendly terms.

"'Not content,' says Fuller, speaking of Nicholas, 'to confine his errors to his own country, over he comes into England, and in the latter end of the reign of Edward the Sixth, joyned himself to the Dutch congregation in London, where he seduced a number of artificers and silly women.'"—Church. Hist., p. 112, ed. 1655.

On the 12th of June, 1575, according to the historian Hollinshed,

"Stood at Paule's Crosse five persons, Englishmen, of the sect termed the Familie of Love, who there confessed themselves utterlie to detest as well the author of that sect, H. N., as all his damnable errors and heresies."

A curious little volume on the history and doctrines of this sect appeared in the year 1572, from the pen of John Rogers, entitled The Displaying of an horrible Secte of grosse and wicked Heretiques, naming themselves the Family of Love, with the Lives of their Authors, and what Doctrine they teach in Corners. Imprinted at London for George Bishop. 1579. 12mo. Christopher Vittall, a joiner of Southwark, who had been infected with the doctrine of Arius some twenty years before, and whose credit was great amongst the Family of Love, was at this period actively engaged in teaching their doctrines. He travelled about the country to disseminate them; and was likewise author of a little book, in reply to Roger's Displaying of the sect, printed in the same year.

At the close of the year 1580 the sect was increasing so rapidly in England, that the government took active measures for its suppression, and the Queen issued a proclamation to search for the "teachers or professors of the foresaid damnable sect," and to "proceed severelie against them." This proclamation may be seen in Hollinshed and in Camden's Annals.^[1]

After the death of Queen Elizabeth—

"The Family of Love (or Lust rather)," according to Fuller, "presented a tedious petition to King James, so that it is questionable whether his Majesty ever graced it with his perusall, wherein they endeavoured to cleare themselves from some misrepresentations, and by fawning expression to insinuate themselves into his Majesty's good opinion."

After printing the petition Fuller proceeds—

"I finde not what effect this their petition produced, whether it was slighted and the petitioners looked upon as inconsiderable, or beheld as a few frantick folk out of their wits, which consideration alone often melted their adversaries' anger into pity unto them. The main design driven on in the petition is, to separate themselves from the Puritans (as persons odious to King James), that they might not fare the worse for their vicinity unto them; though these Familists could not be so desirous to leave them as the others were glad to be left by them. For if their opinions were so senseless, and the lives of these Familists so sensuall as is reported, no purity at all belonged unto them."

The Family of Love, after being exposed and ridiculed both in "prose and rime," finally "gave up the ghost," and was succeeded by another "wicked sect" denominated the Ranters.

Edward F. Rimbault.

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A woman was strangled and burnt for coining in front of the Debtors door, Newgate, on the 10th of March, 1789. I believe this to be the last instance in which this old punishment was inflicted, at least in the metropolis. The burning part of the ceremony was abolished by the 30 Geo. III., c. 48., and death by hanging made the penalty for women in cases of high or petty treason. E. S. S. W.'s informants are wrong in supposing that the criminals were burnt whilst living. The law, indeed, prescribed it, but the practice was more humane. They were first strangled; although it sometimes happened that, through the bungling of the executioner, a criminal was actually burnt alive, as occurred in the celebrated case of Katherine Hayes, executed for the murder of her husband in 1726. The circumstances of this case are so remarkable, that, having referred to it, I am induced to recapitulate the chief of them, in the belief that they will interest your readers. Hayes, who was possessed of some little property, lodged with his wife Katherine in Tyburn, now Oxford Road. Mrs. Hayes prevailed upon two men, named Billings (who lodged in the house) and Wood, a friend of Hayes, to assist her in murdering her husband. To facilitate that object, Hayes was induced to drink the enormous quantity of seven bottles (at that time full quarts) of Mountain wine, besides other intoxicating drinks. After finishing the seventh bottle he fell on the floor, but soon after arose and threw himself on a bed. There, whilst in a state of stupefaction, he was despatched by Billings and Wood striking him on the head with a hatchet. The murderers then held council as to the best mode of concealing their crime, and it was determined that they should mutilate and dispose of the body. They cut off the head, Mrs. Hayes holding a pail to catch the blood; and she proposed that the head should be boiled until the flesh came from the skull. This advice was rejected on account of the time which the process suggested would occupy, and Billings and Wood carried the head in the pail (it was at night) to the Horseferry at Westminster, and there cast it into the Thames. On the following day the murderers separated the limbs from the body, and wrapping them, together with the trunk, in two blankets, carried them to Marylebone fields, and placed them in a pond. Hayes' head not having been carried away by the tide, as the murderers expected it would have been, was found floating at the Horseferry in the morning. The attention of the authorities was drawn to the circumstance, and the magistrates being of opinion that a murder had been committed, caused the head to be washed and the hair combed out, and then had it placed on a pole and exposed to public view in St. Margaret's churchyard, in the hope that it might lead to the discovery of the suspected crime. Great crowds of persons of all ranks flocked to St. Margaret's churchyard to see the head, and amongst the rest a young man named Bennett, who perceiving the likeness to Hayes, whom he knew, immediately went to Mrs. Hayes on the subject; but she assured him that her husband was alive and well, which satisfied him. A journeyman tailor, named Patrick, also went to see the head, and on his return told his fellow workmen that it was Hayes. These workmen, who also had known Hayes, then went to look at the head, and felt the same conviction. It happened that Billings worked at the same shop in which these men were employed in Monmouth Street, and when he came to work next morning, they told him of the circumstance. Billings, however, lulled their suspicious by declaring that he had left Mr. Hayes at home that morning. After the head had been exhibited for four days in the churchyard, the magistrates caused it to be placed in spirits, in a glass vessel, and in that state it continued to be exposed to public view. Two friends of Hayes, named Ashley and Longmore, who had seen the head without imagining that it was his, some time after called on Mrs. Hayes, on separate occasions, to inquire for her husband, whose absence began to be noticed. Ashley and Longmore were mutual friends, and their suspicions being excited by the contradictory statements which Mrs. Hayes had given to them, they went to look again at the head, when a minute examination satisfied them that it had belonged to Hayes. The apprehension of the murderers was the result. On the day they were brought up for examination, the trunk and limbs of the murdered man were found. Wood and Billings confessed and pleaded guilty. Katherine Hayes put herself on her country, was tried and convicted. Wood died in prison. Billings was hanged in Marylebone fields, near the pond in which Hayes's body had been concealed. Katherine Hayes was executed at Tyburn, under circumstances of great horror; for, in consequence of the fire reaching the executioner's hands, he left his hold of the rope with which he ought to have strangled the criminal, before he had executed that part of his duty, and the result was, that Katherine Hayes was burnt alive. The wretched woman was seen, in the midst of flames, pushing the blazing faggots from her, whilst she yelled in agony. Fresh faggots were piled around her, but a considerable time elapsed before her torments ended. She suffered on the 3rd of November, 1726. This tragedy forms the subject of a comic ballad which is attributed to Swift.

C. Ross.

The communication of E. S. S. W. (Vol. ii., p. 6.), which is as interesting as it is shocking, induces me to send you a short extract from Harrison's Derby and Nottingham Journal, or Midland Advertiser. The number of this journal which is dated Thursday, September 23, 1779, contains as follows:—

"On Saturday two prisoners were capitally convicted at the Old Bailey of high treason, viz. Isabella Condon, for coining shillings in Cold-Bath-Fields; and John Field, for coining shillings in Nag's Head Yard, Bishopsgate Street. They will receive sentence to be drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution; the woman to be burnt, and the man to be hanged."

I presume that the sentence which the woman underwent was not executed. The barbarous fulfilment of such a law was, it may be hoped, already obsolete. The motives, however, upon which this law was grounded is worth noting:—

"In treason of every kind," says Blackstone, "the punishment of women is the same, and different from that of men. For, as the decency due to the sex forbids the exposing and publicly mangling their bodies, their sentence (which is to the full as terrible to sensation as the other) is to be drawn to the gallows, and there to be burned alive." "But," says the foot-note, "by the statute 30 Geo. III. c. 48., women convicted in all cases of treason, shall receive judgment to be drawn to the place of execution, and there to be hanged by the neck till dead."

The law, therefore, under which a woman could be put to death by burning, was repealed in 1790.

Blackstone elsewhere says:—

"The humanity of the English nation has authorized, by a tacit consent, an almost general mitigation of such part of those judgments as savours of torture and cruelty: a sledge or hurdle being usually allowed to such traitors as are condemned to be drawn; and there being very few instances (and those accidental or by negligence) of any persons being embowelled or burned, till previously deprived of sensation by strangling."

This corroborates the conclusion of E. S. S. W., that the woman he describes was strangled at the stake to which her neck was bound.

I wish to suggest to any of your legal or other well-informed correspondents, who will have the kindness to take a little trouble for the benefit of your general readers, that an instructive and interesting communication might be made by noting down the periods at which the various more revolting punishments under the English law were repealed, or fell into disuse. For instance, when torture, such as the rack, was last applied; when embowelling alive and quartering ceased to be practised; and whose was the last head that fell under the axe's bloody stroke. A word also on the use of the pillory, ducking-stool, stocks, &c. would interest. Any illustrations of the modification of our penal code would throw valuable light on the philosophy and improvement of the national character. And I believe it would appear that the Reformation gradually swept away the black horrors of the torture-room; that the butchery of the headsman's block ceased at the close of the civil contest which settled the line of regal succession; and that hanging, which is the proper death of the cur, is now reserved for those only who place themselves out of the pale of humanity by striking at human life.

Alfred Gatty.

Ecclesfield.

E. S. S. W. (Vol. ii., p. 6.) will find a case of burning in Dodsley's Annual Register, 1769, p. 117.: a Susannah Lott was burned for the murder of her husband at Canterbury, Benjamin Buss, her paramour, being hanged about fifteen minutes before she was burned.

T. S. N.

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Death-bed Mystery.—In conversation with an aged widow,—as devout and sensible as she is unlettered,—I yesterday learned a death-bed mystery which appeared new to me, and which (if not more commonly known than I take it to be) you may perhaps think worthy of a place in "Notes and Queries," to serve as a minor satellite to some more luminous communication, in reply to B. H. at Vol. i., p. 315. My informant's "religio" (as she appears to have derived it by tradition from her mother, and as confirmed by her own experience in the case of a father, a husband, several children, and others), is to the effect that a considerable interval invariably elapses between the first semblance of death, and what she considers to be the departure of the soul.

About five minutes after the time when death, to all outward appearance, has taken place, "the last breath," as she describes, may be seen to issue with a vapour, or "steam," out of the mouth of the departed.

The statement reminds me of Webster's argument, in his Display of supposed Witchcraft, chap. xvi., where, writing of the bleeding of corpses in presence of their murderers, he observes:

"If we physically consider the union of the soul with the body by the mediation of the spirit, then we cannot rationally conceive that the soul doth utterly forsake that union, until by putrefaction, tending to an absolute mutation, it is forced to bid farewell to its beloved tabernacle; for its not operating ad extra to our senses, doth not necessarily infer its total absence. And it may be, that there is more in that of Abel's blood crying unto the Lord from the ground, in a physical sense than is commonly conceived," &c.

Sir Kenelm Digby (I think I remember) has also made some curious remarks on this subject, in his observations on the Religio Medici of Sir T. Brown.

J. Sansom.

Easter Eggs.-The custom of dyeing eggs at Easter (alluded to, Vol. i., pp. 244. and 397.) prevails in different parts of Cumberland, and is observed in this city probably more specially than in any other part of England. On Easter Monday and Tuesday the inhabitants assemble in certain adjacent meadows, the children all provided with stores of hard-boiled eggs, coloured or ornamented in various ways,—some being dyed an even colour with logwood, cochineal, &c.; others stained (often in a rather elegant manner) by being boiled in shreds of parti-coloured ribbons; and others, again, covered with gilding. These they tumble about upon the grass until they break, when they finish off by eating them. These they call pace-eggs, being no doubt a corruption for pasche.

This custom is mentioned by Brande as existing among the modern Greeks; but I believe it will be found more or less in almost all parts of Christendom.

I observed when in Syria during Easter quantities of eggs similarly dyed; but it did not occur to me at the time to inquire whether the practice was connected with the season, and whether it was not confined to the native Christians.

Information upon this point, and also upon the general origin of this ancient custom, would be interesting.

A Subscriber.

Carlisle, June 3. 1850.

May Marriages (Vol. i., p. 467.).—This superstition is one of those which have descended to Christianity from Pagan observances, and which the people have adopted without knowing the cause, or being able to assign a reason. Carmelli tells us that it still prevailed in Italy in 1750.^[2] It was evidently of long standing in Ovid's time as it had passed then into a proverb among the people; nearly two centuries afterwards Plutarch (Quæst. Rom. 86.) puts the question: Διὰ τί τοῖ Μαίου μηνὸς οὐκ ἄγονται γυναῖκας, which he makes a vain endeavour to answer satisfactorily. He assigns three reasons: first, because May being between April and June, and April being consecrated to Venus, and June to Juno, those deities held propitious to marriage were not to be slighted. The Greeks were not less observant of fitting seasons and the propitiation of the γαμὴλιοι θεοὶ. Secondly, on account of the great expiatory celebration of the Lemuria, when women abstained from the bath and the careful cosmetic decoration of their persons so necessary as a prelude to marriage rites. Thirdly, as some say, because May was the month of old men, Majus a Majoribus, and therefore June, being thought to be the month of the young, Junius a Junioribus, was to be preferred. The Romans, however, held other seasons and days unpropitious to matrimony, as the days in February when the Parentalia were celebrated, &c. June was the favourite month; but no marriage was celebrated without an augury being first consulted and its auspices proved favourable (Val. Max. lib. ii. c. 1.). It would be well if some such superstitions observance among us could serve as a check to ill-advised and ill-timed marriages; and I would certainly advise all prudent females to continue to think that

S. W. Singer.

Mickleham, June 12.

"Trash" or "Skriker."—Many hundreds of persons there are in these districts who place implicit credence in the reality of the appearance of a death sign, locally termed trash or skriker. It has the appearance of a large black dog, with long shaggy hair, and, as the natives express it, "eyes as big as saucers." The first name is given to it form the peculiar noise made by its feet when passing along, resembling that of a heavy shoe in a miry road. The second appellation is in allusion to the sound of its voice when heard by those parties who are unable to see the appearance itself. According to the statements of parties who have seen the trash frequently, it makes its appearance to some member of that family from which death will shortly select his victim; and, at other times, to some very intimate acquaintance. Should any one be so courageous as to follow the appearance, it usually makes its retreat with its eyes fronting the pursuer, and either sinks into the earth with a strange noise, or is lost upon the slightest momentary inattention. Many have attempted to strike it with any weapon they had at hand; but although the appearance stood its ground, no material substance could ever be detected. It may be added that "trash" does not confine itself to churchyards, though frequently seen in such localities.

T. T. W.

Burnley.

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(Continued from Vol. i., p. 387.)

On l. 6. (D.):—

On l. 11. (G.) Drayton has this expression in his Heroical Epistles:—

and afterwards,—

On l. 24. (G.) Most probably from a couplet in Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy:—

And in Randolph's Aristippus,—

On l. 27. (G.):—

Crank is used in a different sense by Drayton:—

On l. 31. (M.):—

On l. 42. (G.):—

On l. 45. (G.):—

On l. 67. (G.) See note already inserted in "Notes and Queries," p. 316.

On l. 75. (G.):—

On l. 78. (G.) So in Comus:—

On l. 80. (G.):—

On l. 117. (Anon.) See extracts from the Diary of a Lover of Literature. To me this line seems to allude to the imagination in sleep:—

On l. 121. (G.):—

On l. 125. (G.):—

and in Spanish Tragedy:—

On l. 187. (G.):—

On l. 144. (D.):—

J. F. M.

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Heber possessed a curious MS. volume entitled A Poetical Miscellany, selected from the Works of the Men of Genius of the XVIIth Century. In Part XI. of the Bibliotheca Heberiana it is thus described:—

"The first part of this volume was obviously collected by a Scotchman, and it includes pieces by Ben Jonson, Wither, Dr. Donne, &c. It must have been made in the latter part of the reign of Charles I. The second portion of the volume is a later production; a humourous poem, called a Whig's Supplication, by S. C., in which there is a remarkable notice of Cleveland, Donne, and 'Bass Divine.' The latter name somebody has ignorantly altered, not knowing, probably, who 'Bass Divine' was. The poem is in imitation of Hudibras, both in style and metre."

It is somewhat singular that the writer of this notice never suspected that the author of the second part, and the collector of the first part of the volume, was Samuel Colvil, whose celebrated poem, The Whigg's Supplication, or the Scotch Hudibras, went through so many editions, from 1667 to 1796. This "mock poem", as the author terms it, turns upon the insurrection of the Covenanters in Scotland in the reign of Charles the Second. An interesting notice of it, and other imitations of Hudibras, will be found in the Retrospective Review, vol. iii. pp. 317-335.

Edward F. Rimbault.

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In a curious MS. Diary of the early part of the seventeenth century, lately come into my possession, I find the following entry concerning the sculptor, Hubert le Sœur:—

"March 7. 1628. Had an interview with y^e famous and justly renowned artiste H. le Sueur, who, being late come to this countrie, I had never seene before. He showed me several famous statues in brasse."

This is probably the earliest notice of the celebrated pupil of John of Bologna after his settlement in England. Dallaway, in his Anecdotes of the Arts in England (p. 395.), after stating that Hubert le Sœur arrived here about the year 1630, says,—

"If he was associated with Pierre Tacca, who finished the horse in the equestrian statue of Henry IV. in 1610, left incomplete on the death of his master, John of Bologna, two years preceding, he must have been far advanced in life. Three only of his works in bronze are now known with certainty to exist: the equestrian statue of Charles I. [at Charing Cross], a bust of the same monarch with a casque in the Roman style [now at Stourhead], and a statue in armour of William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, Lord High Chamberlain and Chancellor of Oxford. The last was given to the University by T., Earl of Pembroke, about the time of the restoration."

The "several famous statues in brasse" alluded to by the writer of the Diary above quoted, were probably those which afterwards ornamented the gardens of St. James's Palace. Peacham, in his Complete Gentleman (2nd edit., 4to. 1634), having spoken of the collection of statues at Arundell House, says:—

"King Charles also, ever since his coming to the Crown, hath amply testified a royal liking of ancient Statues, by causing a whole army of foreign Emperors, Captains, and Senators, all at once to land on his coasts, to come and do him homage and attend him in his Palaces of Saint James and Somerset House. A great part of these belonged to the great Duke of Mantua; and some of the old Greek marble bases, columns, and altars were brought from the ruins of Apollo's temple at Delos, by that noble and absolutely complete gentleman, Sir Kenelm Digby, Kn^t. In the garden of St. James, there are also half a dozen brass statues, rare ones, cast by Hubert le Sueur, his Majesty's servant, now dwelling in St. Bartholomew's, London; the most industrious and excellent statuary, in all materials, that ever this country enjoyed. The best of them is the Gladiator, moulded from that in Cardinal Borghesi's Villa, by the procurement and industry of ingenious Master Gage. And at this present, the said Master Sueur hath divers other admirable moulds to cast in brass for his Majesty, and among the rest, that famous Diana of Ephesus. But the great Horse with his Majesty upon it, twice as great as the life, and now well nigh finished, will compare with that of the New Bridge at Paris, or those others at Florence and Madrid, though made by Sueur, his master John de Bologna, that rare workman, who not long since lived at Florence."

The bronze statue of the Gladiator originally stood (according to Ned Ward's London Spy) in the Parade facing the Horse Guards. Dodsley (Environs, iii. 741.) says it was removed by Queen Anne to Hampton Court, and from thence, by George the Fourth, to the private grounds of Windsor Castle, where it now is. Query, What has become of the other five "famous statues in brass?"

Edward F. Rimbault.

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What became of Bishop Jewell's library? Cassan mentions (Lives of Bishops of Salisbury, vol. ii. p. 55.) that

"He had collected an excellent library of books of all sorts, not excepting the most impertinent of the Popish authors, and here it was that he spent the greatest and the best part of his time," &c.

Bishop Jewell died Sept. 22. 1571.

In the Account Books of Magdalen College, Oxford, I find the following items:—

"A. D. 1572. Solut. D^no Præsidi equitanti Sarisbur. pro libris per billam, iij^li xvi^s.

"Solut. pro libris Dⁿⁱ, episcopi Sar., c^li.

"A. D. 1574. Solut per Dom. Præsidem pro libris M^ri Jewell, xx^li."

Whether these books were a portion only, or the whole of the library of Bishop Jewell, I am unable to discover; nor am I aware at present whether Bishop Jewell's autograph is in any of the books of Magdalen College Library. The president was Lawrence Humphrey, author of a Life of Jewell.

Magdalenensis.

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The low windows in the chancel of so many of our ancient churches have proved a fruitful source of discussion among archæologists, and numerous theories have been advanced respecting their use. Perhaps the words of the chameleon in the fable might be addressed to many who have attempted to account for their existence, "You all are right and all are wrong"—right in your supposition that they were thus used; but wrong in maintaining that this was the exclusive purpose. Some example, in fact, may be adduced irreconcileable with any particular conjecture, and sufficient to overturn every theory which may be set up. One object assigned is, the distribution of alms; and it is surely reasonable to imagine that money collected at the offertory should have been given to paupers from the chancel through this convenient aperture. The following passage from the Ecclesiologist, quoted in page 441. of "Notes and Queries," has induced me to bring this subject forward:—

"In them (churchyards) prayers are not now commonly poured forth to God, nor are doles distributed to his poor."

Now it must be admitted that relief could scarcely be given to a crowd of importunate claimants without the interposition of some barrier; and where could a more appropriate place be found than the low window? Can any of your readers, therefore, oblige me with some information upon these points? Where were the alms bestowed, if not here? An almonry is described in some recent works as "a building near the church." What authority is there for such an assertion, and do any examples of such structures remain? What evidence is there that this business was transacted in the churchyard, in the porch, or in any particular part of the edifice?

Although these mysterious openings are probably, with one or two exceptions in Normandy, peculiar to this country, it is desirable to ascertain where the poor on the Continent usually receive such charitable donations. In an interior of a Flemish cathedral, by an artist of the sixteenth century, a man is represented in the act of delivering bread to a number of eager beggars, from a sort of pew; showing, at least, as above remarked, that some such protection was requisite.

There is another Query connected with this subject, which I beg to submit. Some ancient frescoes were lately discovered in the chapel of Eton College, with a compartment containing (according to a letter in the Ecclesiologist) a bishop administering the Holy Communion to a converted Jew, through a low window. Can any one, from recollection or the inspection of drawings, (for the original has disappeared,) assure me that he does not hold in his hand a piece of money, or a portion of bread, for the supply of his bodily wants?

T.

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North Sides of Churchyards unconsecrated.—In the West of England I have found an opinion to prevail in rural parishes, that the north side of our churchyards was left unconsecrated very commonly, in order that the youth of the village might have the use of it as a playground. And, in one parish, some few years ago, I had occasion to interrupt the game of football in a churchyard on the "revel" Sunday, and again on another festival. I also found some reluctance in the people to have their friends buried north of the church.

Is there any ground for believing that our churchyards were ever thus consecrated on the south side of the church to the exclusion of the north?

J. Sansom.

Hatfield—Consecration of Chapel there.—Le Neve, in his Lives of Protestant Bishops (ii. 144.), states, that Richard Neile, Bishop of Lincoln, went to Hatfield, 6th May, 1615, to consecrate the chapel in the house there lately built by Robert, Earl of Salisbury. I have applied to the Registrar of Lincoln diocese, in which Hatfield was (until recently) locally situated, for a copy of the notarial act of consecration; but it appears that the register of Bishop Neile was taken away or destroyed in the Great Rebellion, and that, consequently, no record of his episcopality now exists at Lincoln.

Le Neve says he had the most part of his account of Bishop Neile from Thomas Baker, B.D. of St. John's College, Cambridge, who had it from a grandson of the Bishop's. He quotes also Featley's MS. Collections.

Can any of your readers inform me whether Bishop Neile's episcopal register for Lincoln is in existence, or whether any transcript of it is known? or if any evidence, confirmatory of Le Neve's statement of the fact and date of the consecration of the chapel of Hatfield, is known to exist?

William H. Cope.

P.S. I have examined Dr. Matthew Hutton's transcripts of the Lincoln registers, in the Harleian MSS., but they do not come down to within a century of Bishop Neile's episcopate.

Ulrich von Hutten (Vol. i., p. 336.).—In one of the Quarterly Reviews is an account of Ulrich von Hutten and the Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum. Will S. W. S., or any one who takes interest in Ulrich, tell me where it is? A meagre article in the Retrospective Review, vol. v. p. 56., mentions only one edition of the Epstolæ, Francfurti ad Mainum, 1643. Is there any recent edition with notes? Mine, Lond. 1710, is without, and remarkable only for its dedication to Isaac Bickerstaffe, Esq., and the curious mistake which Isaac made when he acknowledged it in The Tatler, of supposing the letters genuine. Is it known to what scholar we are indebted for so neat an edition of a book then so little known in England, and so little in accordance with English taste at that time?

H. B. C.

University Club, May 29.

Simon of Ghent.—Can any of your correspondents give me any information concerning Simon, Bishop of Salisbury in 1297-1315, further than what is said of him in Godwini de Præsulibus Angliæ, and in Wanley's Catalogue, where he is mentioned as the author of Regulæ Sanctimonialium Ordinis Sti Jacobi? Why is he called "Gandavensis," or "De Gandavo," seeing that he is said to have been born in London?

J. Morton.

Boetius' Consolations of Philosophy.—Alfred the Great translated this work into Anglo-Saxon; Chaucer, Queen Elizabeth, and Lord Preston into English.

Has Queen Elizabeth's work (which she executed during her captivity before she ascended the throne) been printed? Richard Viscount Preston's appeared first, I believe, in 1712, in 12mo. How often has it been reprinted? What other English translations have been made, and what are the latest?

Jartzberg.

Gloucestershire Gospel Tree.—Mary Roberts, in her Ruins and Old Trees associated with Historical Events, gives a very pretty account of a certain Gospel Tree. Can any kind correspondent inform me where in Gloucestershire it is situated? Although a native of the county, I never heard of it.

W. H. B.

Churchyards—Epitaphs.—Up to the time of the Norman Conquest, churchyards appear to have been considered almost as sacred as churches; but soon after that period, though regarded as places of sanctuary, they were often used for profane purposes. I recollect reading of fairs and rustic sports being held in them as early as John's reign, but unfortunately I have not been an observer of your motto, and know not now where to refer for such instances. I shall therefore feel obliged to any of your readers who will specify a few instances of the profanation of churchyards at different periods, or refer me to works where such may be found. Churchyards appear to have been used in special cases for sepulture from the year 750, but not commonly so used till the end of the fourteenth century. Are there any instances of sepulchral monuments, between the above dates, now existing in churchyards?

Stone crosses, evidently of Saxon or very early Roman structure, are found in churchyards, but I am not aware of any sepulchral monuments detached from the church of the same date. I shall be glad of any notices of early monuments or remarkable epitaphs in churchyards. When did churchyards cease to be places of sanctuary? What is the exact meaning of the word "yard?" and was not "God's acre" applied to Christian cemeteries before sepulture was admitted in churches or churchyards?

W. H. K.

Drayton Beauchamp, June 10.

Anthony Warton.—Who was Anthony Warton, minister of the word at Breamore, in Hampshire, and author of Refinement of Zion, London, 1657? Another Anthony Warton was matriculated at Magdalen College, Oxford, 2nd Nov., 1665, at sixteen, as son of Francis Warton, of Breamore, Hants, plebeian. He remained clerk till 1671; chaplain from 1671 to 1674; instituted vicar of Godalming, Surrey, in 1682; obiit 15th March, 1714-15. He was father of Thomas Warton, Demy and Fellow of Magdalen College, vicar of Basingstoke, Hants, and of Cobham, Surrey, Professor of Poetry in the University of Oxford, 1718-28; who was father of the more celebrated Thomas Warton, Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and of Joseph Warton, Head Master of Winchester School.

Manning says (History of Surrey, vol. i. p. 648.) that Anthony Warton, vicar of Breamore, Hants, was younger brother of Michael Warton, Esq., of Beverley, but originally of Warton Hall in Lancashire. Both Wood and Manning seem to have confounded the first Anthony with the clerk, &c. of Magdalen. Was the former brother of Francis?

Magdalenensis.

Cardinal's Hat.—O'Halloran mentions the cardinal's hat—"birede"—"biretrum"—as the hat anciently worn by the Irish doctors. What is its history?

J. Sansom.

Maps of London.—I should be grateful to any of your correspondents who could inform me whether there are any maps of London before that of Aggas? what they are? and where they are to be found? The date of Aggas's map is supposed to be about 1560, and must have been after 1548, as the site of Essex House in the Strand is there called "Paget Place." There is a MS. map by Anthony Van Den Wyngerde in the Sutherland Collection in the Bodleian, the date of which would be about 1559.

Edward Foss.

Griffith of Penrhyn.—Can any of your correspondents refer me to a good pedigree of Griffith of Penrhyn and Carnarvon?

William D'Oyly Bayley.

Coatham, near Redcar.

The Mariner's Compass.—What is the origin of the fleur-de-lis with which the northern radius of the compass-card is always ornamented?

Nautilus.

Pontefract on the Thames.—Permit me to ask, through the medium of your useful publication, where Pontefract on the Thames was situate in the fourteenth century? Several documents of Edw. II. are dated from Shene (Richmond); in 1318, one from Mortelak; in 1322, one from Istelworth; and several are dated Pountfrcyt, or Pontem fractum super Thamis. (See Rymer's Fœdera). It is very clear that this Pountfrcyt on the Thames must have been at no great distance from Shene, Mortlake, and Isleworth, also upon the Thames; and this is further corroborated by the dates following, from the places alluded to, so closely.

N.

June 14. 1850.

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The extensive study of geometry in Lancashire and the northern counties generally is a fact which has forced itself upon the attention of several observers; but none of these have attempted to assign any reasons for so singular an occurrence. Indeed, the origin and progress of the study of any particular branch of science, notwithstanding their attractive features, have but rarely engaged the attention of those best qualified for the undertaking. Fully satisfied with pursuing their ordinary courses of investigation, they have scarcely ever stopped to inquire who first started the subject of their contemplations; nor have they evinced much more assiduity to ascertain the how, the when, or in what favoured locality he had his existence: and hence the innumerable misappropriations of particular discoveries, the unconscious traversing of already exhausted fields of research, and many of the bickerings which have taken place amongst the rival claimants for the honour of priority.

Mr. Halliwell's Letters on the Progress of Science sufficiently show that the study of geometry was almost a nonentity in England previously to the commencement of the eighteenth century. Before this period Dr. Dee, the celebrated author of the preliminary discourse to Billingsley's Euclid, had indeed resided at Manchester (1595), but his residence here could effect little in flavour of geometry, seeing, as is observed by a writer in the Penny Cyclopædia—

"The character of the lectures on Euclid was in those days extremely different from that of our own time ... the propositions of Euclid being then taken as so many pegs to hang a speech upon."

Similar remarks evidently apply to Horrocks and Crabtree (1641); for although both were natives of Lancashire, and the latter a resident in the vicinity of Manchester, their early death would prevent the exertion of any considerable influence; nor does it appear that they ever paid any attention to the study of the ancient geometry. Richard Towneley, Esq., of Towneley (1671), is known to have been an ardent cultivator of science, but his residence was principally in London. It may, however, be mentioned to his honour, that he was the first to discover what is usually known as "Marriotte's Law" for the expansion of gases. At a later period (1728-1763), the name of "John Hampson, of Leigh, in Lancashire," appears as a correspondent to the Lady's Diary; but since he mostly confined his speculations to subjects relating to the Diophantine Analysis, he cannot be considered as the originator of the revival in that branch of study now under consideration. Such being the case, we are led to conclude that the "Oldham Mathematical Society" was really the great promoter of the study of the ancient geometry in Lancashire; for during the latter half of the last century, and almost up to the present date, it has numbered amongst its members several of the most distinguished geometers of modern times. A cursory glance at some of the mathematical periodicals of that date will readily furnish the names of Ainsworth, whose elegant productions in pure geometry adorn the pages of the Gentleman's and Burrow's Diaries; Taylor, the distinguished tutor of Wolfenden; Fletcher, whose investigations in the Gentleman's Diary and the Mathematical Companion entitle him to the highest praise; Wolfenden, acknowledged by all as one of the most profound mathematicians of the last century; Hilton, afterwards the talented editor of that "work of rare merit" the Liverpool Student; and last, though not least, the distinguished Butterworth, whose elegant and extensive correspondence occupies so conspicuous a place in the Student, the Mathematical Repository, the Companion, the Enquirer, the Leeds Correspondent, and the York Courant. Besides these, we find the names of Mabbot, Wood, Holt (Mancuniensis), Clarke (Salfordoniiensis), as then resident at Manchester and in constant communication with, if not actually members of the society; nor can it be doubted from the evidence of existing documents that the predilection for the study of the ancient geometry evinced by various members of this Lancashire School, exercised considerable influence upon the minds of such distinguished proficients as Cunliffe, Campbell, Lowry, Whitley, and Swale.

Hence it would seem that many, and by no means improbable, reasons may be assigned for "the very remarkable circumstance of the geometrical analysis of the ancients having been cultivated with eminent success in the northern counties of England, and particularly in Lancashire." Mr. Harvey, at the York meeting of the British Association in 1831, eloquently announced "that when Playfair, in one of his admirable papers in the Edinburgh Review, expressed a fear that the increasing taste for analytical science would at length drive the ancient geometry from its favoured retreat in the British Isles; the Professor seemed not to be aware that there existed a devoted band of men in the north, resolutely bound to the pure and ancient forms of geometry, who in the midst of the tumult of steam engines, cultivated it with unyielding ardour, preserving the sacred fire under circumstances which would seem from their nature most calculated to extinguish it." Mr. Harvey, however, admitted his inability clearly to trace the "true cause of this remarkable phenomenon," but at the same time suggested that "a taste for pure geometry, something like that for entomology among the weavers of Spitalfields, may have been transmitted from father to son; but who was the distinguished individual first to create it, in the peculiar race of men here adverted to, seems not to be known." However, as "the two great restorers of ancient geometry, Matthew Stewart and Robert Simson, it may be observed, lived in Scotland," he asks the important questions:—"Did their proximity encourage the growth of this spirit? Or were their writings cultivated by some teacher of a village school, who communicated by a method, which genius of a transcendental order knows so well how to employ, a taste for these sublime inquiries, so that at length they gradually worked their way to the anvil and the loom?"

An attentive consideration of these questions in all their bearings has produced in the mind of the writer a full conviction that we must look to other sources for the revival of the study of the ancient geometry than either the writings of Stewart or Simson. It has been well observed by the most eminent geometer of our own times, Professor Davies—whose signature of Pen-and-Ink (Vol. ii., p. 8.) affords but a flimsy disguise for his well-known propria persona—that "it was a great mistake for these authors to have written their principal works in the Latin language, as it has done more than anything else to prevent their study among the only geometers of the eighteenth century who were competent to understand and value them;" and it is no less singular than true, as the same writer elsewhere observes, "that whilst Dr. Stewart's writings were of a kind calculated to render them peculiarly attractive to the non-academic school of English geometers, they remain to this day less generally known than the writings of any geometer of these kingdoms." The same remarks, in a slightly qualified form, may be applied to most of the writings of Simson; for although his edition of Euclid is now the almost universally adopted text-book of geometry in England, at the time of its first appearance in 1756 it did not differ so much from existing translations as to attract particular attention by the novelty of its contents. Moreover, at this time the impulse had already been given and was silently exerting its influence upon a class of students of whose existence Dr. Simson appears to have been completely ignorant. In one of his letters to Nourse (Phil. Mag., Sept. 1848, p. 204.) he regrets that "the taste for the ancient geometry, or indeed any geometry, seems to be quite worn out;" but had he instituted an examination of those contemporary periodicals either wholly or partially devoted to mathematics, he would have been furnished with ample reasons for entertaining a different opinion.

We have every reason to believe that the publication of Newton's Principia had a powerful effect in diffusing a semi-geometrical taste amongst the academical class of students in this country, and it is equally certain that this diffusion became much more general, when Motte, in 1729, published his translation of that admirable work. The nature of the contents of the Principia, however, precluded the possibility of its being adapted to form the taste of novices in the study of geometry; it served rather to exhibit the ne plus ultra of the science, and produced its effect by inducing the student to master the rudimentary treatises thoroughly, in order to qualify himself for understanding its demonstrations, rather than by providing a series of models for his imitation. A powerful inducement to the study of pure geometry was therefore created by the publication of Motte's translation: ordinary students had here a desirable object to obtain by its careful cultivation, which hitherto had not existed, and hence when Professor Simpson, of Woolwich, published his Algebra and the Elements of Geometry in 1745 and 1747, a select reading public had been formed which hailed these excellent works as valuable accessions to the then scanty means of study. Nor must the labours of Simpson's talented associates, Rollinson and Turner, be forgotten when sketching the progress of this revival. The pages of the Ladies' Diary, the Mathematician, and the Mathematical Exercises, of which these gentlemen were severally editors and contributors, soon began to exhibit a goodly array of geometrical exercises, whilst their lists of correspondents evince a gradual increase in numbers and ability. The publication of Stewart's General Theorems and Simson's edition of Euclid, in 1746 and 1756, probably to some extent assisted the movement; but the most active elements at work were undoubtedly the mathematical periodicals of the time, aided by such powerful auxiliaries as Simpson's Select Exercises (1752) and his other treatises previously mentioned. It may further be observed that up to this period the mere English reader had few, if any means of obtaining access to the elegant remains of the ancient geometers. Dr. Halley had indeed given his restoration of Apollonius's De Sectione Rationis and Sectione Spatii in 1706. Dr. Simson had also issued his edition of the Locis Planis in 1749; but unfortunately the very language in which these valuable works were written, precluded the possibility of these unlettered students being able to derive any material advantages from their publication: and hence arises another weighty reason why Simpson's writings were so eagerly studied, seeing they contained the leading propositions of some of the most interesting researches of the Alexandrian School.

After the death of Simpson, the Rev. John Lawson, who appears to have inherited no small portion of the spirit of his predecessors, began to take the lead in geometrical speculations; and having himself carefully studied the principal writings of the ancient geometers, now formed the happy project of unfolding these treasures of antiquity to the general reader, by presenting him with English translations of most of these valuable remains. With this view he published a translation of Vieta's restoration of Apollonius on Tangencies, in 1764, and to this, in the second edition of 1771, was added the Treatise on Spherical Tangencies, by Fermat, which has since been reprinted in the Appendix to the Ladies' Diary for 1840. In 1767 appeared Emerson's Treatise on Conic Sections; a work which, notwithstanding its manifest defects, contributed not a little to aid the student in his approaches to the higher geometry, but whose publication would probably have been rendered unnecessary, had Dr. Simson so far loosened himself from the trammels of the age, as to have written his own admirable treatise in the English language. The frequency, however, with which Mr. Emerson's treatise has been quoted, almost up to the present date, would appear to justify the propriety of including it amongst the means by which the study of geometry was promoted during the last generation. The success which attended Mr. Lawson's first experiment induced him to proceed in his career of usefulness by the publication, in 1772, of the Treatise on Determinate Section; to which was appended an amended restoration of the same work by Mr. William Wales, the well-known geometer, who attended Captain Cook as astronomer, in one of his earlier voyages. In 1773 appeared the Synopsis of Data for the Construction of Triangles, which was followed in 1774 by his valuable Dissertations on the Geometrical Analysis of the Ancients; and although the author used an unjustifiable freedom with the writings of others, Dr. Stewart's more especially, it is nevertheless a work which probably did more to advance the study of the ancient geometry than any other separate treatise which could be named. As these publications became distributed amongst mathematicians, the Magazines, the Diaries, and various other periodicals, began to show the results of the activity which had thus been created; geometrical questions became much more abundant, and a numerous list of contributions appeared which afford ample proof that their able authors had entered deeply into the spirit of the ancient geometry. During the year 1777 Mr. Lawson issued the first portion of Dr. Simson's restoration of Euclid's Porisms, translated from the Opera Reliqua of that distinguished geometer; and though the work was not continued, sufficient had already been done to furnish the generality of students with a clue to the real nature of this celebrated enigma of antiquity. The last of these worthy benefactors to the non-academic geometers of the last century was Mr. Reuben Burrow, who by publishing in 1779 his Restitution of Apollonius Pergæus on Inclinations gave publicity to a valuable relic which would otherwise have remained buried in the Latin obscurity of Dr. Horsley's more elaborate production.

During the greater portion of the time just reviewed, Mr. Jeremiah Ainsworth was resident in the neighbourhood of Manchester, and so early as 1761 was in correspondence with the editors of the Mathematical Magazine. He subsequently associated with Mr. George Taylor, a gentleman of kindred habits, then resident in the immediate vicinity, and these worthy veterans of science, as time wore on, collected around them a goodly array of pupils and admirers, and hence may truly be said not only to have laid the foundation of the "Oldham Society," but also to have been the fathers of the Lancashire school of geometers. Such then was the state of affairs in the mathematical world at the period of which we are speaking; all the works just enumerated were attracting the attention of all classes of students by their novelty or elegance; Dr. Hutton and the Rev. Charles Wildbore had the management of the Diaries, each vieing with the other in offering inducements for geometrical research; whilst both, in this respect, for a time, had to contend against the successful competition of Reuben Burrow, the talented editor of Carnan's Diary: correspondents consequently became numerous and widely extended, each collecting around him his own select circle of ardent inquirers; and thus it was, to use the words of Mr. Harvey, and answer the questions proposed, that inquiries which had hitherto been "locked up in the deep, and to them unapproachable recesses of Plato, Pappus, Apollonius and Euclid * * porisms and loci, sections of ratio and of space, inclinations and tangencies,—subjects confined among the ancients to the very greatest minds, (became) familiar to men whose condition in life was, to say the least, most unpropitious for the successful prosecution of such elevated and profound pursuits."

The preceding sketch is respectfully submitted as an attempt to answer the queries of Pen-and-Ink, so far as Lancashire is concerned. It is not improbable that other reasons, equally cogent, or perhaps corrective of several of the preceding, may be advanced by some of your more learned correspondents, whose experience and means of reference are superior to my own. Should any such be induced to offer additions or corrections to what is here attempted, and to extend the inquiry into other localities, your pages will afford a most desirable medium through which to compare notes on a very imperfectly understood but most important subject of inquiry.

T. T. Wilkinson.

Burnley, Lancashire, June 5. 1850.

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Passing over various queries of early date, on which it has been my intention to offer some suggestions, I have endeuoyred me, as Master Caxton expresses it, to illustrate three subjects recently mooted.

Trianon (No. 27.).—The origin of this name is thus stated by M. Dolort, in his excellent work entitled Mes voyages aux environs de Paris, ii. 88.

"Le grand Trianon.—Appelé au 13^e siècle Triarmun, nom d'une ancienne paroisse, qui était divisée en trois villages dépendant du diocèse de Chartres. Cette terre, qui appartenait aux moines de Sainte-Geneviève, fut achetée par Louis XIV. pour agrandir le parc de Versailles, et plus tard il y fit coustruire le château."

Wood paper (No. 32.).—At the close of the last century a patent was granted to Matthias Koops for the manufacture of paper from straw, wood, &c. In September 1800, he dedicated to the king a Historical account of the substances which have been used to describe events, in small folio. The volume is chiefly printed on paper made from straw; the appendix is on paper made from wood alone. Both descriptions of paper have borne the test of time extremely well. Murray, in his Practical remarks on modern paper, speaks of Koops and his inventions with much ignorance and unfairness.

Tobacco in the East (No. 33.).—Relying on the testimony of Juan Fragoso, physician to Felipe II. of Spain, I venture to assert that tobacco is not indigenous to the East. To the same effect writes Monardes. Nevertheless, it was cultivated in Java as early as the year 1603. Edmund Scott, factor for the East India Company at Bantam, thus describes the luxuries of the Javans:—

"They are very great eaters—and they haue a certaine hearbe called bettaile which they vsually have carryed with them wheresoeuer they goe, in boxes, or wrapped vp in cloath like a suger loafe: and also a nutt called pinange, which are both in operation very hott, and they eate them continually to warme them within, and keepe them from the fluxe. They doe likewise take much tabacco, and also opium."—An exact discovrse etc. of the East Indians, London, 1606. 4^o. Sig. N. 2.

Bolton Corney.

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Bawn (Vol. i, p. 440.) has been explained as "the outer fortification, inclosing the court-yard of an Irish castle or mansion, and was generally composed of a wall with palisadoes, and sometimes flankers."

The word bawn or bane (the a pronounced as in the English word hat) is still applied in the south of Ireland to the spot of ground used as a place for milking the cows of a farm, which, for obvious reasons, is generally close to the farm-house. Before the practice of housing cattle became general, every country gentleman's house had its bawn or bane. The necessity for having such a place well fenced, and indeed fortified, in a country and period when cattle formed the chief wealth of all parties, and when the country was infested by Creaghadores and Rapparees, is obvious; and hence the care taken in compelling the "undertakers in Ulster" to have at least "a good bawn after the Irish fashion." In Munster the word bane or bawn is used to express land that has been long in grass; tholluff bawn being used to signify grass land about to be brought into cultivation; and tholluff breagh, or red land, land which has been recently turned. To redden land is still used to express either to plough land, or, more generally, to turn land with the spade.

Now the milking field was, and is always kept in grass, and necessarily receiving a good deal of manure, would usually be white from the growth of daisies and white clover. Hence such a field would be called the white field: and from this to the general application of the phrase to grass land the transition is easy and natural. It may be proper to add, that in Kerry, particularly, the word is pronounced bawn, in speaking Irish; but the same person will call it bane, if mentioning such land in English. The a in the latter word is, as I said before, pronounced like the a in hat.

The Irish for a cow being bo, the phrase may have had its origin therefrom. On this matter, as on all relating to Irish antiquities, the readers of "Notes and Queries" may be glad to have a sure person to refer to; and they cannot refer to a more accomplished Irish scholar and antiquarian than "Eugene Curry". His address is, "Royal Irish Academy, Grafton Street, Dublin."

Kerriensis.

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Births, Marriages, &c., Taxes on (Vol. ii., p. 10.).—The first instance, that I am aware of, of a tax on marriages in this country, occurs in the 5 of Wm. and Mary, c. 21. The war in which William engaged soon rendered it necessary to tax other incidents of humanity; and accordingly the 6 & 7 Wm. III. c. 6. was passed, granting to his Majesty certain rates and duties upon marriages, births, deaths, and burials, and upon bachelors and widowers (a widely-spread net), for the term of five years, "for carrying on the war against France with vigour." The taxes on births, marriages, and burials were continued indefinitely by the 7 & 8 Wm. III. c. 35. I know not when this act was repealed; but by the 23 George III. c. 67., taxes were again imposed on burials, births, marriages, and christenings; and by 25 George III. c. 75. these taxes were extended to Dissenters. By the 34 George III. c. 11., the taxes were repealed, and they ceased on October 1st, 1794. The entries in the parish register noticed by Arun, refer to these taxes. Query, Were our ancestors justified in boasting that they were "free-born" Englishmen as long as one of these taxes existed?

C. Ross.

M. or N. (Vol. i., p. 415.).—These must, I think, be the initials of some words, and not originating in a corruption of nom, as suggested. We have in the marriage service:—

All these passages would go to show that the letters are initials either of some word by which the sex was denoted, or of some very common Christian names of each sex, which were formerly in use.

I grant that, in the baptismal service, N. may possibly stand for nomen.

Thos. Cox.

Preston.

Arabic Numerals.—I am not entitled to question either the learning or the "acumen" of the Bishop of Rochester; but I am entitled to question the interpretation which E. S. T. tells us (Vol. ii., p.27.) he puts upon the Castleacre inscription. My title to do so is this:—that in the year of grace 1084 the Arabic numerals were not only of necessity unknown to the "plaisterers" of those walls, but even (as far as evidence has been yet adduced) to the most learned of England's learned men.

As to the regular order in crossing himself, that will entirely depend upon whether the plaister was considered to be a knight's shield, and the figures the blazonry, or not. Is it not, indeed, stated in one of your former numbers, that this very inscription was to be read 1408, and not 1048? I have already hinted at the necessity of caution in such cases; and Mr. Wilkinson of Burnley has given, in a recent number of your work, two exemplifications. The Bishop of Rochester certainly adds another; though, of course, undesignedly.

T. S. D.

Shooter's Hill, June 7.

Comment. in Apocalypsin (Vol. i., p. 452.).—There was a copy of this volume in the library of the Duke of Brunswick; and in the hope that Sir F. Madden may succeed in obtaining extracts, or a sight of it, I intimate just as much, though not in this kingdom. (See Von der Hardt's Autographa Lutheri et Coætaneorum, tom. iii. 171.) You do not seem to have any copy whatever brought to your notice. This collection was, it appears from the Centifolium Lutheranum of Fabricius (p. 484.), bequeathed by the Duke to the library at Helmstad.

Novus.

Robert Deverell (Vol. i., p. 469.).—If my information is too scanty to deserve a place among the Replies, you may treat it as a supplement to Dr. Rimbault's Query. Mr. Deverell also published (according to Lowndes) A New View of the Classics and Ancient Arts, tending to show the invariable Connexion with the Sciences, 4to. Lond. 1806; and Discoveries in Hieroglyphics and other Antiquities, 6 vols. 8vo. Lond. 1813,—which was suppressed by the author after a few copies had been sold. I have the second and third volumes, being all that relates to Shakspeare. They consist of an edition of Hamlet, Lear, Othello, Merchant of Venice, and the third satire of Horace, copiously illustrated with notes and woodcuts, intended to prove that in the works in question, in common with "all the classics and the different specimens of the arts which have come down to us from the ancients, no part of them is to be understood without supposing that they were mere vehicles of knowledge, not intended to meet the eye or the understanding on the first inspection or perusal;" in short, that all the phrases, characters, and incidents are merely allusions to the appearances of the moon! a representation of which, and of Shakspearian characters, &c., bearing supposed resemblance to its lights and shadows, form the staple of the illustrations. I collect from passages in these volumes, that the first was devoted to a similar illustration of Hudibras. The whole affair seems to afford indications of insanity. In the Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors, 8vo., Lond. 1816, I find that in 1802 he was returned to Parliament by the borough of Saltash, in Cornwall: and from the same authority it also appears that, in addition to the works above noticed, he was the author of A Guide to the Knowledge of the Ancients, 1803, and A letter to Mr. Whitbread on two Bills pending in Parliament, 8vo. 1807.

J. F. M.

The Hippopotamus.—The Scotch Kilt.—I was on the point of addressing a Minor Query to you, when No. 33. arrived, and therein I saw a Major Query from L. (p.36.), which prompts an immediate answer. He asks, "Has there been a live hippopotamus in Europe since the reign of Commodus?" To be sure there has, and Capitolinus would have set him right. A goodly assemblage of animals of all sorts was collected by Gordianus Pius, but used by the elder Philip, for the celebration of the secular games on the 1000th anniversary of the building of Rome, or A.D. 248. Among them were 32 elephants, 10 tigers, 10 elks, 60 lions, 30 leopards, 10 hyænas, 1 hippopotamus, 1 rhinoceros, 40 wild horses, 20 wild asses, and 10 giraffes, with a vast quantity of deer, goats, antelopes, and other beasts. "And," it is added in Captain Smyth's Roman Catalogue, "still further to increase the public hilarity, 2000 gladiators were matched in mortal affray."

The portrait of the hippopotamus exhibited on that splendid occasion is well represented upon the large brass medals of Otacilia Severa, Philip's wife, and on those of their son, Philip Junior. That of Otacilia is described at length in Captain Smyth's work.

Now for my Minor Query. Can you, Sir, or any of your intelligent correspondents, oblige me by saying who introduced the kilt into Scotland and when? However it may wound local prejudice, I fear our northern brethren will find its use to be much more recent than they seem willing to be aware of. At present I will not put a rider on the question, by asking, whether an Englishman first gave it them: but perhaps you, Sir, will sift it thoroughly, even although a whole corps of rabid MacNicolls should enter the field against you.

Σ

Ashes to Ashes (Vol. ii., p. 22.).—The word is taken from Genesis, xviii. 27.:

"I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes."

It is plain that this has nothing to do with the treatment of the corpse; but that whatever the exact meaning of the word in Hebrew may be, it is synonymous with dust. As to dust, this is perfectly plain in Genesis, iii. 19.:

"Till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."

Here burial seems to be distinctly meant.

The Latin word cinis, which denotes ashes produced by burning, is derived from the Greek, which denotes natural dust, I forget whether burnt ashes also.

C. B.

Dr. Maginn's Miscellanies (Vol. i., p. 470.).—Mr. Tucker Hunt (brother of Mr. F. Knight Hunt, author of The Fourth Estate, a History of Newspapers, &c. &c.) showed me some years since a collections of these papers from various sources, which he proposed to publish, and which I was very glad to learn, as I had always regretted that Dr. Maginn had left no memorial of his splendid talents in a seperate publication, but frittered away his genius in periodicals. As "J. M. B." appears very anxious to obtain an authentic reference to any article contributed by the Dr., I think if he could communicate with Mr. Tucker Hunt, it might be of great assistance. I have not the latter's address, but probably a note to the care of his brother's publisher, "D. Bogue, Fleet Street", might lead to a communication.

W. H. Lammin.

Fulham, June 5. 1850

Living Dog better than a dead Lion.—For an answer to my Query at Vol. i., pp. 352. 371., where I asked for the authority upon which Baunez gave Homer credit for the expression (which is evidently none of his), "quod leoni mortuo etiam lepores insultant," a friend has referred me to Antholog. Græc.. 8vo. Lipsiæ, 1794, tom. iv. p. 112.; out of which you may, perhaps, think it not too late to insert the following Epigr. xi.

J. Sansom.

Gaol Chaplains (Vol. ii., p. 22.) were made universal by act of parliament in the fourth year of George IV. Before that they may have existed in some places. In Gloucestershire from 1786.

C. B.

Rome Ancient and Modern (Vol. ii., p. 21.)—Such a map as your correspondent A. B. M. describes, was at Rome in 1827. It was by Vasi. I got it, but never saw it in England.

C. B.

Trianon (Vol. ii., p. 47.).—In justice to myself, and in reply to your correspondent C., who believes I have "not the slightest authority" for my explanation of the word Trianon, I beg to refer him to the French dictionaries, in some of which, at all events, he will find it thus written: Trianon, subst. masc., a pavilion.

J. K. R. W.

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Aboriginal Chambers near Tilbury (Vol. i., p. 462.).—Mr. Cook, of Abeley, Essex, having seen this Query, which had been kindly quoted into The Athenæum of the 25th ultimo, communicated to that journal on Saturday, June 1st, the following information respecting two of these caves, the result of a personal examination of them:—

"The shafts are five in number; and are situated at the edge of Hanging Wood, in the parish of Chadwell, about three miles from Grays Pier. I descended two of them in 1847, by means of a rope and pulley fixed to the branch of a neighbouring tree,—taking the precaution to have a lighted lanthorn swinging a few yards beneath me. They were between eighty and ninety feet in depth,—their diameter at the top six feet, gradually diminishing to three feet at the bottom. There was a great deal of drift sand at the bottom of the shaft, extending a considerable way up, which nearly blocked up the entrance to the chambers. By treading down the sand I soon gained an entrance, and found five chambers communicating with the shaft—three on one side and two on the other. In form they were nearly semicircular. Their dimensions were small, not exceeding thirty feet in length by fifteen in width, but very lofty; they were quite dry and free from foul air. The chambers in both shafts corresponded exactly with each other in size, form, and number. I trust this brief account may be of some service to those gentlemen who intend to explore them, and should be most happy to afford any assistance in my power."

Mistake in Conybeare and Howson's Life of St. Paul.—In the splendid and learned Life of St. Paul, now publishing by Messrs. Longmans, there occurs in a note a broad assertion, but quite erroneous, which may mislead those who would be inclined to take it without examination, induced by the general accuracy and learning of the work. At page 35, note 1., the writer says, "It is remarkable that the Sadducees are mentioned in no other books of the New Testament, except St. Matthew and the Acts." I mentioned this as a fact to a friend, who immediately remembered a passage in St. Luke, chap. xx. v. 27.: "Then came to him certain of the Sadducees," &c. I then turned out Sadducees in Cruden, and there found only Matthew and Acts referred to. On looking at the passage of St. Mark parallel to the abovementioned of St. Luke, I read, "Then came unto him the Sadducees," &c. (xii. 18.) The note, therefore, should end, "except the first three Gospels and the Acts."

E. S. Jackson.

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The Rev. W. Haslam, the author of Perran Zabuloe, has just issued a little volume entitled The Cross and the Serpent, being a brief History of the Triumph of the Cross through a long Series of Ages in Prophecy, Types, and Fulfilments. Though the present work belongs to one of the two classes which, for obvious reasons, we do not undertake to notice in our columns, there is so much of curious matter illustrative of Folk Lore, early remains, and old-world customs, in the third part of it, as to justify our directing the attention of our antiquarian readers to the archæology of the volume. The Druidic Beltein or Midsummer Fire still burns brightly, it appears, in Cornwall. We shall endeavour to transfer to our Folk Lore columns some passages on this and other cognate subjects.

Mr. Russell Smith announces a series of Critical and Historical Tracts on the subject of, I. Agincourt; II. First Colonists of New England (this is already issued); and III. Milton, a Sheaf of Gleanings after his Biographers and Annotators. The name of Joseph Hunter, F.S.A., which figures upon their title-pages, is a sufficient warrant that they will deserve the attention of the historical student.

Mr. M. A. Denham, the author of the interesting Collection of Proverbs and Popular Sayings relating to the Seasons, Weather, &c., published by the Percy Society, also intends to issue some Tracts (limited to fifty copies of each) illustrative of the antiquities of the northern parts of the kingdom. The first is to be on The Slogans or Slughorns of the North of England; the second, on "Some of the Manners and Customs" of the North.

We have received the following Catalogues:—Joseph Lilly's (7. Pall Mall) Catalogue of a Choice and Valuable Collection of Rare, Curious, and Useful Books; William Andrews' (7. Corn Street, Bristol) Catalogue, Part IV., 1850, Books just bought from the Deanery, Armagh, &c.; and J. Russell Smith's (4. Old Compton Street, Soho) Bibliotheca Historica et Topographica; Books illustrating the History, Antiquities, and Topography of Great Britain and Ireland.

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(In continuation of Lists in former Nos.)

Grey's Method of Learning Hebrew.

[The edition that contains the History of Joseph as a Praxis, not that which contains the Proverbs.]

Oakley on Our Lord's Passion.

*** Letters, stating particulars and lowest price, carriage free, to be sent to Mr. Bell, Publisher of "NOTES AND QUERIES," 186. Fleet Street.

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Title and Index to Volume the First. A Double Number will be published next week, containing Title and copious Index to the First Volume, price 9d., or stamped to go post free, 11d.

The Monthly Part will be ready at the same time, price 1s. 9d., including the Title and Index.

Delta. The following appears to us the true reading of the legend of the seal transmitted:—

There appears little doubt as to the last word, whatever may be the locality intended. "Gallatum" has been used for "Wallop" in Hampshire, but it is doubtful if this seal applies to that place.

C. F. O. The Phigaleian Marbles are in the British Museum. The casts described were modelled from them by an accomplished London Artist.

Errata.—No. 33., p. 39, 40., in the article Cosas de España, Tereda should be Texeda; and for Carrascon, which recently had been reprinted, read has.

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TO BOOKSELLERS, PRINTERS, STATIONERS, and LITERARY MEN in General, a Country Business, established upwards of Fifty Years, and yielding a net profit of 300l. per annum, is now to be sold a great Bargain: it embraces Printing, Bookselling, and Stationery; is carried on in the West of England, on premises admirably adapted for its various branches, and held at a very Low Rental. About 1200l. or 1300l. will be required for the purchase of the Stock, Printing Presses, &c., (which is of the best description), one-third of which may remain on approved Security. Address by Letter only to T. W., Messrs. Simpkin, Marshall, and Co., Stationer's Court, Ludgate Hill.

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Vols. I. and II. 8vo., price 28s. cloth.

THE JUDGES OF ENGLAND; from the TIME of the CONQUEST. By Edward Foss, F.S.A.

"A work in which a subject of great historical importance is treated with the care, diligence, and learning it deserves; in which Mr. Foss has brought to light many points previously unknown, corrected many errors, and shown such ample knowledge of his subject as to conduct it successfully through all the intricacies of a difficult investigation, and such taste and judgment as will enable him to quit, when occasion requires, the dry details of a professional inquiry, and to impart to his work, as he proceeds, the grace and dignity of a philosophical history."—Gent. Mag.

London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans.

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MEMOIRS OF MUSICK. By the Hon. Roger North, Attorney-General to James. I. Now first printed from the original MS. and edited, with copious Notes, by Edward F. Rimbault, LL.D., F.S.A, &c. &c. Quarto; with a Portrait; handsomely printed in 4to.; half-bound in morocco, 15s.

This interesting MS., so frequently alluded to by Dr. Burney in the course of his "History of Music," has been kindly placed at the disposal of the Council of the Musical Antiquarian Society, by George Townshend Smith, Esq., Organist of Hereford Cathedral. But the Council, not feeling authorised to commence a series of literary publications, yet impressed with the value of the work, have suggested its independent publication to their Secretary, Dr. Rimbault, under whose editorial care it accordingly appears.

It abounds with interesting Musical Anecdotes; the Greek Fables respecting the origin of Music; the rise and progress of Musical Instruments; the early Musical Drama; the origin of our present fashionable Concerts; the first performance of the Beggar's Opera, &c.

A limited number having been printed, few copies remain for sale: unsold copies will shortly be raised in price to 1l. 11s. 6d.

Folio, price 30s.

THE CHORAL RESPONSES AND LITANIES OF THE UNITED CHURCH OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND. Collect from Authentic Sources. By the Rev. John Jebb, A.M., Rector of Peterstow.

The present Work contains a full collection of the harmonized compositions of ancient date, including nine sets of pieces and responses, and fifteen litanies, with a few of the more ancient Psalm Chants. They are given in full score, and in their proper cliffs. In the upper part, however, the treble is substituted for the "cantus" or "medius" cliff: and the whole work is so arranged as to suit the library of the musical student, and to be fit for use in the Choir.

London: George Bell, 186. Fleet Street.

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Preparing for publication, in 2 vols. small 8vo.

THE FOLK-LORE of ENGLAND. By William J. Thoms, F.S.A., Secretary of the Camden Society, Editor of "Early Prose Romances," "Lays and Legends of all Nations," &c. One object of the present work is to furnish new contributions to the History of our National Folk-Lore; and especially some of the more striking Illustrations of the subject to be found in the Writings of Jacob Grimm and other Continental Antiquaries.

Communications of inedited Legends, Notices of remarkable Customs and Popular Observances, Rhyming Charms, &c. are earnestly solicited, and will be thankfully acknowledged by the Editor. They may be addressed to the care of Mr. Bell, Office of "Notes and Queries," 186. Fleet Street.

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THE LATEST WORK ON NINEVEH.

Now ready, Fourth Edition, with upwards of 100 Plates and Woodcuts, 2 vols. 8vo., 36s.

NINEVEH AND ITS REMAINS: being a Narrative of Researches and Discoveries amidst the Ruins of Assyria. With an account of the Chaldean Christians of Kurdistan; the Yezidis, or Devil-worshippers; and an Enquiry into the Manners and Arts of the Ancient Assyrians. By Austen H. Layard, D.C.L.

"This is, we think, the most extraordinary work of the present age, whether with reference to the wonderful discoveries it describes, its remarkable verification of our early biblical history, or the talent, courage, and perseverance of its author. We have had our Bruces and Mungo Parks, as well as our Parrys, Franklins, Backs, and Rosses, but we question whether a more enlightened or a more enterprising traveller than Mr. Layard is to be met with in the annals of our modern English history."—From the Times.

John Murray, Albemarle Street.

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Published Monthly, price 6d.; Stamped, 7d.; or in advance, 6s. 6d. a Year,

THE ENGLISH JOURNAL OF EDUCATION, specially designed as a medium of Correspondence among the Heads of Training Colleges, Parochial Clergymen, and all Promoters of sound Education, Parents, Sponsors, Schoolmasters, Pupil-Teachers, Sunday-Teachers, &c.

London: George Bell, 186. Fleet Street.

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THE DEVOTIONAL LIBRARY. Edited by Walter Farquhar Hook, D.D., Vicar of Leeds.

The Devotional Library was commenced in 1846. The design of the Proprietors was to publish, at the lowest possible price, a series of Works, original, or selected from well-known Church of England Divines, which, from their practical character, as well as their cheapness, would be peculiarly useful to the clergy for parochial distribution. Since that period the following have appeared:—

The above may also be had, bound together in cloth, as "Helps to Daily Devotion," price 8d. cloth.

The Clergy and others purchasing for distribution, are informed that a reduction of twenty per cent. will be made on all orders of not less than 10s. in amount, if addressed direct to the Publisher, Mr. Slocombe, Leeds, or to Mr. Bell, Fleet Street, London, and payment made on delivery.

Leeds: R. Slocombe. London: G. Bell.

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Printed by Thomas Clark Shaw, of No. 8. New Street Square, at No. 5. New Street Square, in the Parish of St. Bride, in the City of London; and published by George Bell, of No. 186. Fleet Street, in the Parish of St. Dunstan in the West, in the City of London, Publisher, at No. 186. Fleet Street aforesaid.—Saturday, June 22. 1850.

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