Bart., K.C.B., so created in 1812?-one married to Naylor, Esq.; another, "Diana, married in Calcutta, in 1780, to Joseph Cator, merchant, afterwards of Beckenham." LINCOLNSHIRE.

YEOMAN OF THE WARDROBE.-Will some reader kindly supply me with the name of the successor of Thomas Dixon, who was appointed "Yeoman of the Wardrobe to Queen Elizabeth in 1603, also the date of succession? R. W. DIXON. Seaton Carew, West Hartlepool.

Replies.

"LES SUPERCHERIES LITTÉRAIRES
DÉVOILÉES."

(4th S. viii. 347, 412, 432, 489; ix. 21; xi. 125.) Since I sent my last note, Nov. 25, 1871 (p. 432), to you on this work the inquiry has crept on slowly but surely. The Supercheries of Quérard being finished, the subscribers are now waiting with anxiety the completion of the third edition of Barbier's celebrated Dictionnaire. As the work has progressed through and in spite of the late war and siege of Paris, it is to be hoped that the same perseverance will see it to a successful end. I now have to note the following corrections:

Vol. iii. col. 858. The title of a work called Les Mystères de Londres, par Sir Francis Trollopp, is given. Sir Francis Trollopp is a name assumed by Paul Féval.

A foot-note says that there is a writer, "English or American," named Francis Trolloppe, which is inexact. There is an English authoress named Frances Trollope, but there is no Francis, nor any author named Trolloppe with two p's. The name of "Trollopp," as they put it, seems to give the French great trouble. A reference to our Men of the Time would have elucidated the matter.

In col. 992 f. occurs the following: "Warren (Sam.) ps sous lequel ont été imprimés les premiers romans de Dickens." It is doubtful whether Mr. Samuel Warren or Dickens would have felt more offended at such a mistake as this. The editors of the Supercheries must, in their errata, cancel this article; especially when we refer to the statement about Boz, vol. i. col. 315 ("N. & Q.," 4th S. viii. 348).

At col. 999 we find the Memoirs of Harriette Wilson vritten (sic) by herself, and we are told that this work was written by Thomas Little (not Thomas Moore, however, who wrote under that pseudonym). Can any of your readers give me any information of the above Thomas Little? Lowndes gives the Memoirs, and so does Allibone, but neither mentions Little. Harriette Wilson might have been the authoress. She is credited with the authorship of Clara Gazul, &c., in 1830, a work that of course should not be confused with

one of much the same title, by Prosper Mérimée. (See the Supercheries, vol. ii. col. 142.) I am unable to explain what could have induced two authors in the same year to adopt the name of Clara Gazul. Did the disreputable one adopt it from the reputable?

On col. 1001 d. we have what seems to me to be a mistaken interpretation of the pseudonym "Oldbook," which has been assumed by a French writer. I apprehend that it simply means if translated vieux-livre. The editors, however, translate it by "vieux bouquin," or even, they intimate, something worse. I took vieux bouquin to mean old buck, and that alone, but on referring to the French and English Dictionary by Molé, Tauchnitz, Jeune, 1847, I find bouquin means "old book" as well as old buck." This leads me to ask whether "book" is synonymous with "buck" in English. However this may be, I think there can be no doubt that a person who takes the pseudonym of "Old book means that and not "Old buck." This ends my notes on the Supercheries. I have observed a few "printers' errors (poor printer!) in the English portion, and some little curiosities which make one regret the proof-sheets were not submitted to an English eye, but most of these any Englishman can himself correct. I have also a few corrections for Barbier's Dictionnaire, which I may have an opportunity of noting.

I have been struck with the persistent manner in which all, or nearly all, the English names have been more or less turned into French, a most unwarrantable practice, but more especially so for bibliographers. A learned French author, Adrien Baillet, in his Auteurs Déguisez, published in Paris in 1690, countenanced and even approved this vicious practice, and this has probably been an authority and excuse ever since. If we follow their example, Gustave Brunet would become Gustavus Brunett; Pierre Janet, Peter; and Olivier Barbier, Oliver Barber.

I may here observe the great improvement in the bibliography of the Supercheries under M. Brunet's auspices. Quérard and all the other bibliographers of his time had very loose notions of scientific bibliography as distinguished from what I may call literary men's bibliography.

The improvement applies still more to M. Barbier's Dictionnaire, which has much improved since the first edition. As an example, the reader can refer to No. 410, in the edition of 1806. It is the above-quoted work, Baillet's Auteurs Déguisez. The improvement in the manner of cataloguing in the third edition of 1872, col. 320 e., is seen in the greater correctness with which the title, &c., is given, and the addition of the collation. Though in the collation there is a little point I should like to notice. It is this. Baillet's work is, to all intents and purposes, anonymous. Nevertheless, on the page devoted to the list of corrections and the

"Privilege du Roy" (a page, by-the-bye, not in Barbier's collation, which is, therefore, so far defective), we find that the permission to print is given to the "Sieur A. B." Thus the author's initials do occur in the book, though not for the cataloguer's purpose, so as to make it pseudonymous. Baillet's little but excellent treatise was, I believe, the origin and cause of A. A. Barbier's great work. He began by trying to find out the titles of the books referred to by Baillet, and was so led on till he produced the best work of its kind that has yet been done. New Barnet, Herts.

OLPHAR HAMST.

THE ROOT "MIN- 29 MINNOW (5th S. iii. 321, 371, 413, 449; iv. 32, 92, 177.)-I fear O. W. T. (p. 177) has for once made a mistake which he does not make, I think, very often. He has adopted the supposed derivation of the English minnow from the French without having first looked at the evidence. We must not trust to the dictionaries in such cases, but rather look to our literature. Before we attempt etymology, we should always trace the history of the word. Let us first find a few instances.

In the Babees Boke I find menewes, p. 280; menuce, p. 171; menuse, p. 168; minoes, p. 220. These are late instances. The form menoun occurs (says Jamieson) in Barbour's Bruce; I believe the word is really the plural in the form menownys, but I have lost the reference. At any rate, this takes us back to A.D. 1375.

However, to_save_time, I may as well say at once that the Low-Latin menas occurs in Elfric's Colloquy, and that the native term by which that was interpreted in order to render it intelligible to the juveniles of the period was mynas. A word thus familiar in England at so early a period cannot well have been merely borrowed from the French. If borrowed at all, it was taken from the Latin directly, and from a somewhat different Latin form.

If the argument is that the French form may have affected our modern form, I have nothing to say against it. It may have done so ; but it is hardly amongst the language of the more juvenile portion of the less educated classes (to whom the word is quite familiar) that we should expect to find the French influence very strong.

The fact is that a root like min- is unaffected by Grimm's law; hence the curious likeness of the cognate forms minimus in Latin and minnists in Maso-Gothic; yet even here the likeness only extends to the root, though the words have the very same meaning.

have also minni in Icelandic, mindre in Swedish and Danish, and minder in German, meaning less. I see no reason why minnow may not be a truly native word; and I think that two facts point that way-viz., (1) that min- is a known LowGerman root, and (2) that the form mynas actually occurs in a very old Colloquy in which easy words were inserted for the use of the juveniles. The same root is, of course, equally Gaelic, equally Scandinavian, and equally Latin, and naturally produced, through the Latin, a French form so closely resembling our native one as, easily enough, to have been confused with it.

I observe, at p. 175, that COL. ELLIS expresses a belief that Sanskrit is derived from the Teutonic, and not the Teutonic from the Sanskrit, "as is generally believed." I am glad to see this protest, because it is a healthy sign that, in course of time, the "general belief" will come round to what is actually shown by the evidence, viz., that Sanskrit is quite as much (and, I may add, quite as little) derived from the Teutonic as is the Teutonic from the Sanskrit. The English, Latin, Greek, High German, Sanskrit, and some other languages are simply, in their older forms, equal and parallel; and it is incorrect to talk of derivation of a word in any one language from a word in any other unless there is plain evidence that the word was actually borrowed by importation, either of the article which bore the foreign name, or else of a stream of people who brought the new term with them. Simple and elementary considerations of this character are constantly being lost sight of, which may be an excuse for my wandering off to the mention of them. WALTER W. SKEAT.

Cintra Terrace, Cambridge.

O. W. T. says that "it seems" (to him) "that the dictionaries are right in tracing the root of minim and minnow to the French, and that the derivation would thus be Lat. minutus, small," &c. The true root, long anterior to the Latin minus and minor and to their French derivatives, is the Celtic and Gaelic min, small, tender, delicate; also meal that has been ground small from grain or corn. In the same ancient language, min bhrist signifies to break small or pulverize, and mineachd signifies softness, delicacy, fineness, or smallness of texture. The ideas of littleness and affection led to the formation of the medieval German word minne, love, whence the Minnesingers or troubadours, who sang love-songs, and the Lowland Scotch word minnie, applied by young children affectionately to their mother.

Fern Dell, Mickleham.

CHARLES MACKAY.

·

"A very remarkable appendage to some fonts is a small projecting bracket or ledge near the upper part, as exhibited in the woodcut of that from Pitsford Church, Derbyshire. Another occurs at Youlgreave, Derbyshire (engraved in Markland's Remarks on English Churches, p. 92). The use is altogether uncertain. Some have supposed that it was intended to receive the crewet of holy oil."

The latter use seems to have been very likely. The projection, however, of the font at Pitsford, which is of much later date, was evidently intended for a different purpose from that at Youlgreave, possibly, as Mr. Paley suggests, to hold a crucifix, as small holes in it still exist. The font at Youlgreave is also remarkable for its representation of a salamander of by no means common occurrence (a type of baptism). I have a vivid recollection of this very interesting font, of which I have my sketch lying before me. The junction between the bowl and the stem is without mouldings, and instead there are rude corbels.

EDMUND B. FERREY.

The "stoup" inquired about by your correspondent is, I take it, a chrismal, that is, a vessel for containing the oil, or chrism, with which persons, in ancient times, were anointed immediately after the sacrament of baptism.

Whether the position of the chrismal were generally such as the one "in Youlgreave Church" I cannot say but considering that this part of the ancient office was performed instantly after baptism, it would certainly be very convenient, and therefore not unlikely.

The best authority I am acquainted with on all matters of this kind is Martene's De Antiquis Ecclesiæ Ritibus, and in turning to this, I find, at p. 68, vol. i., fol. 1788,

"Levat eum a fonte, et faciens crucem de chrismate cum pollice in vertice ejus cum invocatione S. Trinitatis, et dicit; Deus omnipotens, Pater Domini nostri Jesu Christi, qui te regeneravit," &c.

"He raises him from the font, and signing him with the sign of the cross, with chrism, on his forehead, and invoking the Holy Trinity, says, Almighty God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath regenerated thee," &c. This, I think, is conclusive as to the time of the chrismation. See also Ducange, sub voce, and Bingham's Orig. Eccl., vol. ii. b. viii. ch. vii. § 6.

EDMUND TEW, M.A. The stoup on the font at Youlgreave was, very possibly, in order to receive the vessel with the oil used in the service of baptism. A niche near the font in some churches was also used, as is supposed, for the same purpose. Such a one occurs in Toot Baldon Church, Oxon, and is thus described::

"The nave has four early English arches on each side. The eastern respond, which is of this character,

ED. MARSHALL.

CAPTAIN BURTON: LOUIS XIV. (5th S. iii. 366, 507, 520.)-An_interesting correspondence with MADAME VAN EYs has given me the following corrections respecting the Louis XIV. history. She shrewdly observes that so great an event as a marriage between Louis XIV. and Madame de Montmorency was not likely to pass away and leave no trace in the annals of the French Court. She first calls in question the date of Lady Primrose's marriage, and then goes on to say, The husband of the Comtesse de Montmorency may have been descended from a Constable of Montmorency, but can never have been a Constable himself, Louis XIII. having suppressed the office of High Constable of France on the 13th of March, 1627. The two Montmorencys who have been High Constables of France at so modern a date-for there were many in a much more ancient period-are Anne, Duc de Montmorency, and his son, Duc Henri, who died on the 1st April, 1614. He left several children, legitimate and illegitimate. Secondly, according to Burke's Peerage, Miss Drelincourt married the third Viscount Primrose in 1739, and became a widow in 1741; so that it is only after 1739 that she can have taken charge of a son of Louis le Jeune, or after 1741 that she could have married Louis le Jeune himself, supposing the second version should be the right one. It would be important," says MADAME VAN EYS, "to ascertain the exact date of Lady Primrose's birth. Her father, Pierre Drelincourt, the Dean of Armagh, was the son of Charles Drelincourt, who was born in 1595, married in 1625, had sixteen children, and died in 1669, so that the Dean of Armagh was born before that date. It would be also important to find out the date of his death, to see whether he can have been

the godfather of the child in charge of his daughter when she was Lady Primrose, that is to say, between 1739 and 1741. If we had the date of Lady Primrose's birth it would give us her age in 1741, and show the possibility or impossibility of a subsequent marriage with Louis le Jeune." MADAME VAN EYS further remarks that since we know that she cannot have taken charge of the child before 1739, it is strange that Louis le Jeune should speak of the licentiousness of his father's Court, Louis XIV. having been dead since 1715, and she believes there is more probability in the second version. Louis le Jeune, coming as an infant to England in 1685, must have been about fifty-seven in 1741, and at that age may very possibly have been the second husband of Lady

Primrose.

The third version of the story, as given in the second letter to "N. & Q.," certainly seems to support the first version; but then a new difficulty arises from the expression, "his maternal uncle, Dr. Drelincourt." MADAME VAN EYS is of opinion that the first step to be taken is to find out the date of Pierre Drelincourt's death, and the date of the birth of his daughter, Lady Primrose, without which it is impossible to establish these facts. There is a family of Montmorency who claim relationship with the French Montmorency, and still bear the name of Anne, after the famous Constable. They live at Streatham. There is also a genealogical memoir of the family of Montmorency, styled De Marisco or Morres, ancient Lords of Marisco, or Montemarisco, in the peerage of England and Ireland, Paris, 1817. It is in the British Museum. This branch came over with William the Conqueror, and settled eventually in Ireland, and have a common origin with the French Montmorencys. I now ask some reader of "N. & Q." for the date of the birth of the Dean of Armagh, and for the date of the birth and death of his daughter, Lady Primrose. It is said that Louis XIV. had many illegitimate children besides those of La Vallière and De Montespan. They were brought up in ignorance of their royal origin; the daughters were mostly put into convents and the sons into the Army. There was a valet-dechambre to Louis XIV. when he was a boy, named La Porte, who is supposed to have had, in after life, the care of many of those children. His memoirs are in the British Museum. The mysterious affair of the Comtesse de Montmorency is most interesting in a genealogical and historical point of view, and I hope we shall arrive at the truth, for public information, and for my especial interest, which is

Daughter, Sarah Young, married to Dr. John Campbell, LL.D., Vicar-General of Tuam, Galway. Daughter, Maria Margaretta Campbell, married to the Rev. Edward Burton, Rector of Tuam, Galway.

Son, Lieut.-Col. Joseph Netterville Burton, 36th Regt.

Son, Captain Richard Burton, my husband, who is consequently great-great-great-grandson of Louis XIV., and is also probably, if we can only prove it, entitled to an English baronetcy dating from 1622. ISABEL BURTON.

backed

"LOOK BEFORE YE LOUP" (5th S. iv. 168.)-A second part of this "Tract for the Times," and entitled Anither Box of Healin' Sa' for the same Crackit Crowns, by this same author, bears date 1794, " & sold at Edin: by W. Brown." Look before ye Loup is one of a host of patriotic pamphlets, in prose and verse, got up in Scotland to stem the mania for liberty which followed the French Revolution, and the introduction of Tom Paine's writings. This belongs to the dramatic class :-Scene, an Ale-house.-Harry Heeltap, Simon Shuttle, Sandy Snip, Patie Plenshaw, Willie Whittle, and others, seated round a table; Harry in the chair, The Rights of Man before him. In the midst of the discussion a very dramatic effect is produced by Jenny bursting into the room, and, in a few energetic sentences, delivering her verdict upon the matter in hand not at all in accordance with the sederunt; but, being up by Charlie Clod, a country farmer, who enters opportunely, the tables are turned upon the craven politicians, and all are walked off to their ordinary occupations, singing "God save the King," with three huzzas for the British constitution. This amusing thing was reprinted by Colvill at Dundee in 1819, which, with the name on the second part, gives a colouring to a note I have of its being the work of one Brown, editor of the Dundee Repository. It may not be out of place here noting another little piece before me, provoked by the same Friends of the People, and having the same loyal end in view; it is The Rights of Asses, Edin., 1792, also anon., with a frontispiece representing a conclave of solemn donkeys braying out their dissatisfaction with things as they are, in demands for "Liberty and more Corn," &c. ; another was The Patriotic Wolves, by the Rev. W. Robb, 1792-probably all following suit from Hannah More, who, in the south, was using her powerful pen against the same political incendiaries, her tract, in the style under notice, being the Village Politicians, addressed to all the Mechanics, Journeymen, and Day Labourers of G. B. By Jamie Chip, a Country Wright.

J. O.

ILFRACOMBE (5th S. iii. 449; iv. 31.)-According to Cox, Mag. Brit., 1720, vol. i. p. 513, the

Charter of Incorporation was then still in force, and the town was liable to return burgesses to Parliament, but had hitherto been excused. De Foe's account, in the first edition, of the town, 1725, is rather fuller than that which is quoted at p. 31. He says:

"A good Market and Port town called Ilfar-Comb, a town of good Trade, Populous, and rich; all which is owing to its having a very good harbour and Road for ships, and where ships from Ireland often put in," &c.

In Britton and Brayley's Devonshire Illustrated, 1832, the town is described as having been a considerable seaport in 1346, when it sent six ships and eighty-two seamen for the Calais fleet. The Lord Fitz Warine, who appears to have then been Lord of the Manor, accompanied Edward III. on this occasion. The harbour, pier, and lighthouse were wholly maintained by the Lords Fitz Warine, and their descendants, the Bourchier Wreys, till 1731, when an Act of Parliament was passed for repairing the pier and harbour of Ilfordcombe, in Devonshire.

addition to the great parish church (113 ft. by 61 ft.) there were once four chapels within the parish. T. F. R.

Pewsey.

LONDON ALMANACS (5th S. iv. 81, 139.)—MR. LENIHAN's note recalled to my memory that I had amongst my books a similar volume in red morocco, having on the back and covers, in thirteen different places, the stamp in gold of the monogram "G. R.," surmounted by the crown. It contains thirteen different almanacs for the year 1723, and must at one time have been in the hands of royalty. They are arranged in alphabetical order, and each is provided with a finding slip of parchment, the name of the author being written on the projecting part. I have good reason to believe that it contains a complete collection of all the almanacs printed for the Company of Stationers for that year. The titles abbreviated are:-

Sutton.

EDWARD SOLLY.

Your correspondents have omitted to mention the North Devon Handbook (1856, Banfield, I'combe*), from which I venture to copy the following:

"Of the antiquity of the harbour the following particulars afford interesting proof. In a list or roll of the Fleet of Edward III., taken A.D. 1346, Ilfracombe is described as having provided six vessels and 96 men: whereas the Mersey found but one vessel and 5 men."

Ilfracombe was also a place of some importance in the Civil Wars, for about Sept. 1644

4.

'The Ladies' Diary; or, the Woman's Almanack. Being the twentieth ever publish'd of that kind." An Ephemeris; or, an Astronomical State of the Heavens..... By George Kingsley, Gent. loμaðŋματικός.

66 5.

6. "Vox Stellarum; being an Almanack. . . . . By Francis Moore, Licens'd Physician, and Student in Astrology."

7. "Merlinus Liberatus. An Almanack.... By John Partridge."

...

8. "Parker's Ephemeris. . . . The thirty-fourth impression." 9. "The Celestial Diary; or, an Ephemeris. By Salem Pearse, Student in Physick and Coelestial Science." 10. "Poor Robin; 1723: an Almanack after the Old and New Fashion. Written by Poor Robin, Knight of the Burnt Island, a Well-wisher to the Mathematicks." 11. "Apollo Anglicanus; the English Apollo.. By Richard Saunder, Student in the Physical and Mathematical Sciences."

St. Nicholas's Chapel was used from early times as a lighthouse (see Veysey's Register, ii. fol. 13, 14th April, 1522):

:

"In capella S Nicolaii super Portum Ville de Ilfracombe fundata, Luminare quoddam singulis annis per totam hiemem nocturnis temporibus in summitate dicte capelle ardens, velut stella nocte coruscans inseritur." An indulgence of forty days is also offered by the bishop to all true penitents, " qui ad dicti Luminis sustentationem manus porrexerint adjutrices." In

* Edited by Rev. G. Tugwell, M.A.

...

13. “Ολύμπια Δώματα ; or, an Almanack. . . . By John Wing, Philomath."

The Ladies' Diary (No. 4) has an engraving of the bust of a lady in the dress of the period. Round the four sides of the square frame are printed the following lines :—

1. "Hail, Sacred Nymph! whose Merits are Divine, Who like bright Stars illustriously do shine." 2. "The Times approach (if right the Muse divine) When female Honour in its turn shall reign.” 3. "Then Aristotle shall grow out of date, And Euclid's fame share poor Megara's fate."