Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/279

 10 s. XL MAR. 20, 1909.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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WESTMINSTER ABBEY ALMSMEN : WAR- HANT FOB APPOINTMENT. At 10 S. iv. 168 a, question was asked concerning this ancient body of men, and at p. 236 of the same volume a reply from my pen was inserted. This was in September, 1905. I there spoke of the warrant authorizing the appointment, but was unable to supply a copy thereof, and only recently have I been successful in my search. A short time ago Mr. John Stocker, one of the almsmen, died at a great age, and through the kindness of the person to whom the warrant now belongs I am able to print a copy in ' N. & Q.'

The warrant is written on white foolscap paper, bearing the official stamp of the Secretary of State, Home Department, and occupies about two and a half pages, not very closely written, and with a wide margin at the left-hand side. The wording is as follows :

VICTORIA R. Trusty and well-beloved, we greet you well !

Know ye that we, minding the relief of Our poor Subject John Stocker, have given and granted, and by these presents for Us, Our Heirs and Successors, do give and grant, unto the said John Stocker the room and place of one of Our Almsmen to Our Collegiate Church of Saint Peter, Westminster, for and during Our pleasure, void by the death of Thomas Weale, late one of the Almsmen thereof.

Wherefore We will and desire you not only to admit and place the said John Stocker into the said Almsman's place belonging to Our Collegiate Church aforesaid, but also to pay and allow unto liim, from tune to tune, after his admittance all such Wages, Fees, Duties, and other Allowances, as shall be due and incident to the same, in as large, ample, and beneficial manner as any other Almsmen there have, receive, and enjoy, by the Foundation thereof.

Provided always that if the said John Stocker liath any other Almsman's place elsewhere, then this Our present grant to be void and of none effect.

And these Our Letters shall be your sufficient Warrant.

Given at Our Court at Saint James's, the twelfth day of July, 1890, in the Fifty -fourth Year of Our Reign.

By Her Majesty's Command.

(signed) HENRT MATTHEWS.

This warrant has the seal impressed diamond-wise between two pieces of thin paper, and affixed so that half of it overlaps the bottom of the paper.

The endorsement reads :

To Our Trusty and Well-beloved the Dean and Chapter of Our Collegiate Church of Saint Peter, Westminster, now and for the time being.

With reference to the signature of the late Queen, it is sufficient to say that it is lear and distinct, as was usual, and full of the character for which it was always noted.

John Stocker was an old Army man, and served for many years in India in the days of the East India Company.

W. E. HARXAND-OXLEY.

Westminster.

EDWARD II.'s DEATH : " REGEM occi- DERE," &c. In preparing my recently printed ' Life-Pilgrimage of William of Wykeham,' I came across new reasons for believing that Bishop Adam de Orlton was not the author of the famous Latin message often detailed as sent to Edward II.'s keepers at Berkeley Castle. Strickland's ' Lives of the Queens of England ' gives the message as possibly sent by Orlton ; other historians quote it with full faith in his authorship : " Regem occidere nolite timere bonum est." The sense depends on the placing of the omitted comma. Now, in the same century, but in distant Hungary, this Latin quibble is found attributed to a Slavonic archbishop as also promoting a royal tragedy (passim, see notes to Kings- ley's ' A Saint's Tragedy ') ; and the chronicle of Alberic ascribes the famous message to an Archbishop of Strigonium in the twelfth century, making my case stronger, Orlton being of the thirteenth. I have little doubt other nations possess the story in their own histories where circumstances have allowed. Who can doubt that the pseudo -message was no laboured composition of a busy states- man in tragical moments, but a hackneyed " chestnut " provided by the idle brain of some mediaeval undergraduate, and foisted on historical persons where circumstances might appear to allow a point to its wit ?

The " Hoc fecit Wykeham " story about. Windsor Castle is but a similar " chestnut," which Bishop Lowth declares he cannot trace back beyond Parker.

W. LANCELOT Fox.

12, Heathfield Terrace, Chiswick, W.

ANTHONY'S NOSE. Dr. Timothy Dwight, in his 'Travels,' iii. 357 (New-Haven, 1821), comments on the frequency of this name in New York State :

" There is a mountain of this name on the Hudson, forming the southern limit of the High- lands on that river ; two more on the Mohawk ; and a fourth on this lake [Lake George]. The first and last are lofty summits, faced with per- pendicular precipices. I know not whether the Nose of St. Anthony was or was not so remark- ably precipitous, as in a striking manner to re- semble the figure of these mountains."

As the early settlers came over from Holland, it seems probable that some other and later Anthony is thus commemorated. RICHARD H. THORNTON.