we do not even know when it ultimately fell into disuse. And so again with regard to beefeater, it may well have been spelled in other ways without there being any record of it. PROF. SKEAT allows that it was in use as early as 1610, and yet it is not found either in Minsheu (1617), or in Sherwood (1632), or even in Bailey (1733). This shows what the dictionaries of those days were really worth. I therefore suspend my judgment until there is a good French and a good English dictionary for the period named-until, in fact, I know more about both words. * some one who has something to do with a buffet. Eur-the or of the Lat. ator, and our er (when it has an active signification) is a common ending of those substantives which are derived from active verbs.t Buffeteur, therefore, as stated in my note, is the substantive which corresponds to buffeter, to taste, and not buffetier. In conclusion, I will just say one word with regard to the banter which I have frequently noticed that PROF: SKEAT thinks fit to indulge in at the expense of those who venture to differ from him in opinion. If it pleases him, and if he thinks it worthy of him, pray let him continue it; but for the assumption that, because some people suppose that in one case the final letters, etier, of a French word have been corrupted into eater in English,‡ therefore these people must also be of opinion that in all French words ending in etier this etier must have become eater in English! F. CHANCE. Sydenham Hill, The only thing else that I attempted to do was to show that buffetier, if introduced into Eng-myself I fail to see either wit, point, or logic in lish, might become beef-eater, and with this part of my note PROF. SKEAT has not attempted to deal seriously. If there had been any real difficulty in this part of the matter, so eminent a comparative philologist as Prof. Max Müller would not have adopted the derivation from buffetier. With regard to PROF. SKEAT'S statement that he knows of no proof that beef-eater ever meant a waiter at a sideboard, may I ask him if he really knows exactly either what their duties were or what they now are ?-for I confess that I do not. We all know that specimens of the race are to be seen at the Tower, but there are, no doubt, many others. In the Popular Encyclopædia (Blackie & Son, 1874) I find beef-eaters described as "Yeomen of the guard of the sovereign of Great Britain. They are stationed by the sideboard at great royal dinners. There are now one hundred in service, and seventy supernumeraries. They are dressed after the fashion of the time of Henry VII."* I should like to know whether they are really still (or if they ever were) stationed by the royal sideboard on grand occasions. This is an important point, and might, one would think, be settled, as far, at least, as the present time is concerned. In his suggestion, that "if we had borrowed the word, it would have been more sensible to have given it the sense of wine-taster,"" PROF. SKEAT makes a serious blunder, from which he would have been saved if he had more carefully studied the rules of French word-formation. Buffetier never did and could not mean "winetaster." French substantives in ier (like the corresponding Lat. termination arius, which is properly adjectival) are never, that I know of, derived from verbs. They are, as a rule, formed from other substantives. Buffetier, therefore, cannot come from the verb buffeter, which alone contains the idea of tasting, but comes from buffet, and means If their quaint costume is really that of Henry VII., who died in 1509, it would seem to show that they were instituted more than a hundred years earlier than PROF. SKEAT supposes; for it is evident that if they were first introduced at the beginning of the reign of James I. (1603-1625), they would scarcely be dressed in the style of a hundred years earlier. P.S.-Since this note was written two notes on the subject have appeared in "N. & Q.," from SIR SIBBALD D. SCOTT and MR. A. SMYTHE PALMER, but it is, of course, impossible for me to say much about them in a postscript. From SIR SIBBALD Scorr's note, however, it appears that the beefeaters ate nearly half as much again of veal and mutton as they did of beef, and that they were not more renowned for their eating than were the scullions. And MR. PALMER'S quotations seem to me to prove nothing more than that the writers named took the word, as it was very natural they should, to be compounded of beef and eater, and made their jokes accordingly. I should like the unbiassed testimony of writers who have stated facts about beef-eaters without mentioning or even alluding to the etymology of the word. I wonder that none of your regular correspondents have resuscitated Sir Francis Palgrave's guess as to the derivation of the word beefeater. It occurs in his learned Essay upon the Original Authority of the King's Council, printed in 1834 for the Record Commission. At p. 92 of that essay he gives the text of a whimsical bill pre it is, as will be noticed, an elastic one. Anybody, there*This is the ordinary meaning of the ending ier, and fore, who was merely stationed by a buffet, whether for show or for protection (there is much gold and silver plate on palace sideboards), or for both, would be very liable to be called a buffetier, even though he had nothing to do with the wine. Comp. chambrier, one who has charge of a chamber, voiturier, one who has charge of a voiture (in this sense cart or waggon). † Eur, however, like our er, is sometimes also found as the termination of substantives derived from neuter verbs, as, e. g., in dormeur, parleur, voyageur. Nor is it even accurate to say so. The etier (in buffetier) would naturally first become eter in English, as I showed in my note (p. 362, note ), and it would be this eter which would become eater. ferred to Humphry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, as warden of the Cinque Ports, an office to which he was appointed 26 Hen. VI.; and the following is an extract from the said bill: "John Symmys, Clerk, the Vicary of Westhame, mekely sheweth that William Wevare and Perys his servaunte," besides doing sundry mischievous acts to his annoyance, threatened the life of his catte, "and thereupon they slewe your sayd besecheris catte of grete malice, by cause they myght not have there intente of hym, and caste him into his yarde, but in trowth your sayd besecher had lever haue geven them forty shillings than they had kylde his catte. And after that they kilde capons, hennys, and chikenys of your sayd besecheris, and many of them they ete at divers tymes, and many of them they caste into your besecheris close. And also with force of armys, with bowys, arrowys, and longdebefys many times within this three year, have entered your sayd besecheris close & made there bost that yf they myght take hym they wolde sle hym," &c. On the word longdebefys this is Sir Francis's note: "A 'longe-de-bef' was a halbert with a broad blade, so called from its resemblance to the tongue of an oxlangue-be-beuf. It is possible that the yeomen of the guard obtained their popular appellation of beef-eaters from this weapon. As from Halbert and Musket are derived Halberteer and Musketeer, so Longe-de-befeteer would be formed from longe-de-bef, and which might be afterwards abbreviated into Befeteer." Via Principe Amedeo, Rome. ROBERT SINCLAIR. In my Words, Facts, and Phrases, p. 53, I have a short note on this word, which, although it throws no light on the origin of the word, shows that it has been in use nearly three hundred years in its present shape. It runs as follows: "Beefeater. There is reason for thinking that the derivation of this word from buffetier is erroneous, and that the modern name of the royal servants is also the original one. At any rate, the following extract from Histrio-mastix, III. i., 93, 101 (circa 1585-1600), quoted in Simpson's School of Shakespeare, vol. ii. p. 47, shows that it has been in use nearly three hundred years:— 'Steward. These impudent audatious serving men scarcely beleeve your honour's late discharge. First Servant. Believe it? by this sword and buckler no; stript of our liveries and discharged thus? Malvortius. Walke Sirs, nay walke, awake ye drowsie drones That long have suckt the honney from my hives; The Callis Cormorants from Dover roade Harborne, Birmingham. E. EDWARDS. ST. CUTHBERT'S MS. OF ST. JOHN'S GOSPEL (6th S. vi. 486).—The following is Appendix No. 1 of my Historical Sketches of the Reformation, pp. 399-401, London, 1879: The Durham and Stonyhurst Anglo-Saxon MS. Copy of St. John's Gospel. Having been enabled to trace this MS. from the time that it was taken away from Durham, by Dr. Thomas Lee, one of King Henry's Commissioners, to the present day, I took the liberty of writing to the Rector of Stonyhurst, in whose safe keeping it now is, for some particulars concerning the inscription on its fly-leaf. In reply to my communication, I received the following courteous letter, with the interesting information and particulars which follow: Stonyhurst College, Blackburn, Sep. 16, 1878. Rev. and dear sir,-Absence from the college has delayed my reply to yours of the 8th inst. The MS. in question is a Latin copy of the Gospel of St. John only. The enclosed contains all the information that I can find in answer to your queries......Believe me, rev. and Yours obediently, dear sir, E. J. PURBRICK, S.J. The Rev. Frederick George Lee, D.C.L. St. Cuthbert's MS. Gospel of St. John.-The inscription at the beginning occurs on the fly-leaf opposite the first page of the text. The handwriting is said by Whitaker to resemble that which is characteristic of charters temp. Edw. I. It runs thus :-Evangelium Joh'is quod inventum fuerat ad caput beati patris nostri Cuthberti in sepulchro jacens. Anno translac'onis ipsius. Pasted against the cover at the end, with no fly-leaf intervening between it and the last page of the text, is a paper, the writing on which runs thus: Hunc Evangelii Codicem ab [Georgio] Henrico Comite de Litchfield* et dono dedit Patribus Societatis Jesu, Collegii Anglicani Joanne Howard Thomas Phillips, Sac. Can. Ton. In a case along with the MS. is a letter, in the same handwriting as the above inscription, of which a copy follows this. The signature has been cut off; also the lower right-hand corner of the paper, which is a single sheet, has been accidentally torn off and lost, leaving lacunæ at the ends of the last three lines of the letter. One of the lacune certainly contained the word "Cuthbert," and no more. They are all of the same length. 20th June [no place]. My dear and honoured Father, I desire your Reverence to accept of this MS. which this note accompanies, for your Library. You will see by the short inscription at the beginning, how and when and where it came to be discovered; and I have every reason to think it is *George Henry Lee, D. C. L., the third Earl of Litchfield, and the donor of this MS. to the Rev. Thomas Phillips, was born May 21, 1718. Through his grandmother he was great-grandson of King Charles II. In his father's lifetime, and as Viscount Quarendon, he was elected M. P. for the City of Oxford, in Feb., 1739. On attaining his title he became successively High Steward and Chancellor of the University of Oxford, to which he was a great benefactor, being still remembered He married Diana, by name at Commemoration. daughter and heiress of Sir Thomas Frankland, of Thirkleby. co. York., Bart., and died without issue, aged fifty-four, in 1772. He was buried at Spelsbury, Oxfordshire, where a beautiful marble monument to his memory and that of his countess still remains on the south wall of the chancel. Saint Cuthbert's handwriting from the concurring evidence of these circumstance. I showed it the Society of Antiquaries in London, and they said they could......me so far as to its being of the age in which S...... lived; the letter M being formed, as it is in this......that only. [Alia manu] Thomas Phillips to Father J. Howard. I may add that I am unable for certain to identify Thomas Lee as a member of the family of Lee of Quarendon; but that he belonged to it, and was a most discreditable member of it, there can be little doubt. His doings-he is styled "younge and pompatique "-and those of some of his relatives are set forth in Ellis's Letters on the Suppression of the Monasteries, and there can be no doubt that he purloined the MS. The race from which Thomas Phillips, the author of the Life of Cardinal Pole, sprang came from Wales, and took up their abode as tenants at Thame under Sir John Williams (afterwards Lord Williams of Thame). Thomas Phillips's father was a lawyer, allied to the Fienes-Trotmans of Syston, co. Gloucester. They are styled in existing deeds of the sixteenth century "Phillips alias Coxe." Descendants lived, and were buried with monumental memorials and records, at Ickford, Worminghall, and Shabbington, co. Bucks, and some of them, in humble life, still remain at Thame. FREDERICK GEORGE LEE. All Saints' Vicarage, Lambeth. THE DEATH OF HAMPDEN (6th S. vi. 368).When Lord Nugent was collecting materials for his Memorials of John Hampden, published in 1832, one of the doubtful points which it was desirable to clear up was the true cause of Hampden's death, which took place on June 24, 1643, in consequence of injuries received at the battle of Chalgrave Field, between the Parliamentary and Royalist forces, on June 18, 1643. The accounts of his death given by historians are vague and contradictory. Clarendon says (ed., 1703, ii. 204), "Mr. Hambden; who, being shot into the shoulder with a brace of bullets, which brake the bone, within three weeks after died." Clough (Hampden's chaplain?) says "he received two carrabine shott in his arme, which brake the bone," and died, having "indured most cruel anguish for the space of 15 dayes." According to Echard, ii. 414, he was shot into the shoulder with a brace of bullets which broke the bone, and within six days after dy'd with great torment." Whilst Warwicke (Memoires, p. 239) says, "Mr. Hambden received an hurt in the shoulder, whereof in three or four dayes after he dyed." Lastly, it was said, on the authority of a MS. in Lord Oxford's handwriting, that he died in consequence of the shattering of his hand by the bursting of his own overloaded pistol. 66 The grave of John Hampden was opened, the coffin raised, and the body it contained was care fully examined by Lord Nugent, Counsellor Denman, and others, on July 21, 1828, when it was found that the right hand had been amputated previous to death, and that the shattered finger bones were laid beside the corpse wrapped in cere cloth. The left shoulder was found to be dis located, probably from a fall; but the bones of neither shoulder showed any evidence of injuries by bullets. This seemed fully to bear out the truth of Sir Robert Pye's statement in Lord Oxford's MS. A full account of the matter is given in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1828, pt. ii. p. 125-7, and is also to be found in most of the public newspapers. In the Times, on the following day, a statement was inserted to the effect that there was reason to doubt whether the body so examined was really the corpse of Hampden. The John Bull was bitter on this, and said, "We believe it was, but the unlucky discovery that he had blown his own hand off, so entirely deprived his death of the glory of martyrdom, that the Whiggamites resolved upon falsifying their own statements, to save the reputation of the Patriot." EDWARD SOLLY. MR. SYMONDS will find an account of Hampden's exhumation, or supposed exhumation, and the shattered state of his hand in Lord Nugent's Memorials of John Hampden. I say supposed exhumation, because it was asserted that the body which Lord Nugent and companions examined in 1828 was not the body of Hampden, and not even the body of a man, but of a woman who had died in child-birth; and that the loose bones found in a funeral glove like a pocket," and maintained by them to be the shattered bones of Hampden's hand, were really the bones of the deceased's newlyborn infant. In 1863 MR. WILLIAM JAMES SMITH gave an account in "N. & Q." (3rd S. iii. 11) of the exhumation, at which he had been present. [See also p. 72 of the same vol. of "N. & Q."] This was reproduced in the Times, and gave rise to a correspondence on the subject which appeared in that journal in January of that year. BONACCORD. A YORKSHIRE GHOST STORY (6th S. vi. 508).— The account given by A. J. M. of the ghostly cat winding in and out of the banisters in going upstairs reminds me of similar conduct in another ghostly cat which I heard of from Mr. Procter, the owner of Willington Mill, the haunting of which is narrated in such an authentic way by W. Howitt and Mrs. Crowe. Being at Newcastle in the winter of 1873-4, at a time when I was sceptical as to the existence of ghosts, I took advantage of the opportunity to visit Mr. Procter, for the sake of hearing from his own mouth a confirmation of the published accounts. I was received with much kindness, and found him a serious, intelligent gentleman, between sixty and seventy, a Quaker I believe, and I am quite certain that he fully believed everything that he told me. He spoke of his children having chased a monkey all about the house, and, in answer to a question of mine, said that the only occasion on which he himself saw anything mysterious was one evening, when on going into the furnace room he saw a tabby cat by the fire. There was nothing unusual in its appearance, and it would not have caught his attention at all had it not begun to move. But then, instead of walking like an ordinary cat, it wriggled along like a snake. He walked up to it and followed it across the room, holding his hand about a foot above it, until it passed straight into the solid wall. It would be very interesting to the members of the Society for Psychical Research if A. J. M.'s friend, Mrs. A., could be induced to tell the story herself, or to communicate with 31, Queen Anne Street. H. WEDGWOOD. FRANC. BALTH. SOLVYNS (6th S. vi. 429).Although not always to be depended upon, I find the best account of Solvyns in Stanley's edition of Bryan's Dictionary of Painters and Engravers :"Solvyns, Francis Balthasar, a marine painter, was born at Antwerp in 1760. His sea-pieces, however, are not numerous, as his fondness for travel led him to visit India, where he employed himself in observing and depicting the customs and manners of the people. This work was first engraved and published at Calcutta in 1799, and afterwards republished at Paris in 1808, in four atlas folio volumes, with the letterpress in French and English, at the price of a hundred guineas. It consists of nearly three hundred coloured plates of the occupations, festivals, and costumes of the Hindoos. In the preface to this latter edition the author complains of the piracy committed on his former work by a London publisher. He says, 'A Mr. Orme published in London a piecemeal collection, a sort of counterfeit of a set of sketches which I had formerly published at Calcutta, and which, even in the country itself, were received with great applause. They were, however, no more than a rough outline of some part of what I now publish. An early and regular education in the imitative arts in the school of a most celebrated master, painful journeys, continued absence from my native country, long residence in a foreign climate, care, fidelity, study, and expense, I have spared none of these to acquire true and ample information, and render my work as interesting and meritorious as the subject would admit. May the reception which it meets from the public prove that the execution is not unworthy the labour and expense.' It met, however, with very little encouragement, and involved its author in pecuniary embarrassment. He died in 1824. One of his marine pieces, a view from Ostend, is in the palace at Vienna." British Museum. GEORGE WILLIAM REID. by his pen and pencil. He was patronized by the Callis Court, St. Peter's, Isle of Thanet. RUBENS AND TITLE-PAGES (6th S. vi. 513).— Antwerp printer and publisher, 1610-57, had, on Joannes Meursius, i.e., Jean de Meurs, the designer of his title-pages. To the example menmore than one occasion, the aid of Rubens as a tioned by R. H. may be added the elegant titlepage, designed by Rubens and engraved by Cornelius Galle, of the poems of Pope Urban VIII. (Maphæi S.R.E. Card. Barberini......Poemata). The printer's device of Meursius is one of great beauty. It has been described by various biblionot, however, recollect any mention of the name graphers, so that a repetition is unnecessary. I do of Rubens in connexion with it, although there is no doubt respecting its acknowledgment, as, on an original impression before me at this moment the names of Rubens as the painter and of Cornelius Galle as the engraver are fully set forth. 1741. FREDK. HENDRIKS. ALDERMAN SIR JOHN LEQUESNE (6th S. vi. 489).-He was deputy, and in October, 1735, elected alderman, of Bread Street Ward, and in 1739 served the office of sheriff of London. He was a member of the Grocers' Company, married Miss Mary Knight April 25, 1738, and died March 18, Dame Mary Lequesne married secondly, as his second wife, Robert Knight, of Barrels, co. Warwick, created August 8, 1748, Baron Luxborough, of Shannon, in Ireland, and on April 30, 1763, further advanced to be Viscount Barrels and Earl of Catherlough. The countess died s.p. 1795, and lies buried in the churchyard at Hampton, Middlesex. H. M. VANE. Eaton Place, S.W. AN ANTIQUE BROOCH ITS MEANING (6th S. vi. 428).-The circle surrounding the fylfot or croix gammée may in this particular instance have been due to the fancy of the maker; a circular outline being a usual and convenient form for a brooch; but the mystic swastika within a circle forms an emblem which is not exclusively Christian or Pagan, Gnostic or Agnostic, but which, deriving its remote origin in the East, is now to be met with from the Himalayas to Cape Cormorin, in Thibet and in Japan, and may be looked for wherever traces exist of the worship of the Phallus and of the Sun. It represents the fourfold or intensified power of the Lingam within the fruitful tion. Yoni, and is the symbol of creation and reproducO. S. He accompanied Sir Home Popham in a voyage to the Red Sea and the East Indies, and having arrived in Hindostan, he studied the languages, THE NAVAL BRIGADE IN THE CITY (6th S.vi.429). manners, customs, and religion of the Hindoos, It would appear from the Editor's note appended that he might be able accurately to illustrate them to a query of MR. ESCOTT'S (4th S. ii. 228) that the Buffs is the only regiment which has the pre- ACILEGNA (6th S. vi. 537).—B. J. M. inquires the meaning of the word Acilegna, which he finds on an antique gold cross. Has he observed that if he reverses the letters the inscription reads Angelica? Possibly he may think that this word also needs explantion. I really do not know why it should appear on a cross, though it would be easy to offer many suggestions; as, for example, that Angelica may have been the name, real or assumed, of the wearer of the cross. W. SPARROW SIMPSON. gate churchyard. J. How. The author of the statment in The Gospeller could have had no knowledge of Sir William Rawlings. I knew him well, meeting him very frequently at the residence of my cousin Thomas Crook, a retired solicitor, at Battersea Rise, about '20 or '21. Rawlings was knighted when sheriff; he was deputy HEDGE OR EDGE (6th S. vi. 450).-W. F. H. of Bishopsgate ward, and a perfect gentleman. has mistaken the meaning of hedge in the quota-There is, or was, a tomb over his remains in Bishopstions he makes. To hedge is a cant phrase derived from the turf, and means "to secure a doubtful bet by making others." In that sense it is easy to understand "hedging the battle at the price of his liberty." So hedging the Deceased Wife's Sister Bill must mean having some other object in view which would be gained by passing the Act. The application of the word is at once seen. Hedge, however used, involves the idea of protection, shelter, and may be applied in a variety of ways. The word is used in this sense by Shake speare: "The king in this perceives him, how he coasts And hedges his own way. But in this point All his tricks founder." Henry VIII., III. ii. Hedging away from something" is a mistake. It should be edging. If a man sneaks off, he naturally takes the line of least observation, which is usually the outer line or edge of the locality. Of course, this may happen also to be a hedge, but not necessarily so. The two words have nothing in common. The radical idea of the one is protection; that of the other the boundary line of a surface, which becomes in many cases the sharp cutting edge. J. A. PICTON. Sandyknowe, Wavertree. THE ALDINE SYMBOL (6th S. vi. 324).—At p. 25 of "Clarissimi viri D. Andreæ al- | ciati Emblematum libellus, vigilanter | recognitus, & ab ipso iam au- | thore locupletatus. | [Printer's device] | Parisiis, | Apud Christianum Wechelu', sub scuto | Basiliensi, in vico Iacobeo: & sub | Pegaso, in vico Bellouacensi. | M.D.XLIIII.," is the device of the anchor encircled by the dolphin accompanied by the following inscription : FOWLING LAYER (6th S. vi. 469).-The grant of an "evening layer or fowling place on the north side of Weston Hill" would be the grant of a station there for the purpose of shooting wild fowl on their way from the sea (in Sand Bay); the grant of a "morning layer" would confer a similar right to intercept the birds on their passage seawards. This kind of sport is (or was) called "going to rode." The word rode is evidently the same flight in a body. Cf. 1 Sam. xxvii. 10, and Shakas road or rode, an expedition, foray, and refers to speare, King Henry VIII., IV. ii., where Singer explains the word as "courses, stages, journeys." It is also commonly used here as a verb, e. g., "They (the wild fowl) do mostly rode in to Ebden warf of an evening" (Note the interesting local use of warf or warth, A.S. warop, a shore). E. Coles, English Dict. (1676) gives "Rodnet, a net for blackbirds or woodcocks"-evidently a net set to intercept the birds in their flight. Possibly, therefore, the grant of fowling layers may have conferred the right of placing such nets. W. F. R. |