Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 10.djvu/624

 518

NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. x. DEC. 26,

THE FIRST SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS: PETER DE MONTFORT (10 S. x. 3gg). Creighton in his ' Life of Simon de Montfort ' mentions five sons of the great reformer, Henry, Guy, Simon, Amaury, and Richard, but describes Peter as his cousin. See p. 183 of the ' Life ' in the series of " Historical Biographies " :

"The only instance of favouritism on Simon's part is' the very trivial act of lending his cousin, Peter de Montfort, a house at Westminster which was in the hands of the Kin?."

According to Rishanger's ' Continuatio Matthsei Parisii,' Petrus de Monteforti was one of fifteen uexilliferi captured by the King's forces at Northampton in 1264 (see p. 669 of Watts's edition of Matthew Paris, 1644). The chronicle continues : " Quos omnes transmisit ad diuersa castra, sub arcta custodia conseruandos." Polydore Vergil repeats the former part of this statement, describing the captives as " equestris ordinis uiri." The * Con- tinuatio ' records his death at the battle of Evesham along with Simon and Simon's son Henry. Peter appears to have been a pronounced supporter of the constitutional reforms inaugurated at Oxford in 1258. According to Stubbs (see ' Con- stitutional History,' vol. ii. p. 82), his name is mentioned in the ' Royal Letters,' ii. 153, as one of the representatives of the barons in the committee of twenty-four appointed to draw up a provisional constitution, also as one of the permanent Council of Fifteen which was to advise the King on all affairs of State, and one of the twenty-four Com- missioners of the Aid. Stubbs also notes a statement in Matthew of Westminster to the effect that Peter de Montfort, along with four others of the original twenty-four, was still faithful to the Provisions in 1261.

C. E. LOMAX. Louth, co. Lincoln.

JEFFREY HUDSON THE DWARF (10 S. x. 390, 438). Probably ' Peveril of the Peak,' chap, xxxiii. et seq., and Scott's interesting biographical note appended to the novel, give the best modern picture of this valiant mannikin, " whose little body lodged a mighty mind." The Christian name of the victim in the great duel is not given ; the victor is made to refer to him respectfully as " the honourable Mr. Crofts." In his note Scott says that Hudson is often men- tioned in anecdotes of the reign of Charles I., and he quotes from the ' Jeffreidos,' in which Sir William Davenant somewhat pon- derously makes merry at the dwarf's expense.

He goes on to say that in 1682 Hudson was apprehended as a suspect in connexion with the Popish Plot, " and confined in the Gatehouse prison, Westminster, where he ended his life in the sixty-third year of his age." He adds that his portrait was painted by Vandyke, and that " his clothes are said to be preserved as articles of curiosity in Sir Hans Sloan's Museum."

In his ' Common-Place Book,' i. 227, Southey quotes from Wright's ' History of Rutlandshire ' a passage which seems to indicate that the writer was personally acquainted with Hudson. After stating that he had " heard him several times, affirm " that he grew little or none between the ages of seven and thirty, but that after passing the latter stage he quickly reached the permanent stature of " about three foot and nine inches," the historian proceeds thus :

" The cause of this he ascribed (how truly I know not) to the hardship, much labour and beating, which he endured when a slave to the Turks. This seems a paradox, how that which hath been observed to stop the growth of other persons should be the cause of his. But let the Naturalists recon- cile it."

A reference to this county history might be productive of further information.

THOMAS BAYNE.

There is a brief biography of him in Caul- field's ' The Book of Wonderful Characters,' pp. 331-3, Hotten, n.d. W. B. GERISH.

Bishop's Stortford.

SUFFRAGETTES (10 S. x. 467). Cf. 'The Next Generation,' by J. F. Maguire, M.P., 1871. G. W. E. R.

MAN IN THE MOON IN 1590 (10 S. x. 446). I do not understand what is meant. The first reference in ' N.E.D.' to this phrase is as early as 1310. See p. 125 of the letter M, col. 1. WALTER W. SEE AT.

M. HOMAIS (10 S. x. 469). M. Homais is a character in Flaubert's ' Madame Bovary,' a type of the bourgeois, a free- thinking apothecary, an ass tinged with literature and science. Mr. Pickwick might with equal reason be described as a typical Englishman. J. W. M.

CHARLES, CARDINAL ERSKINE (10 S. ix. 87 ; x. 377). A portrait of this cardinal may be found most probably at the Papal printing and publishing establishment in Rome, where portraits of all the cardinals are kept for sale. I have obtained portraits there upon various occasions. C. MASON.

29, Emperor's Gate, S.W.